| Sundatherians | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Grandorder: | Euarchonta |
| (unranked): | Sundatheria |
| Subgroups | |
Sundatheria is a proposed clade of placental mammals. It includes the orders Scandentia and Dermoptera. An alternative phylogeny is the Primatomorpha hypothesis. [1]
A mammal is a vertebrate animal of the class Mammalia. Mammals are characterized by the presence of milk-producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three middle ear bones. These characteristics distinguish them from reptiles and birds, from which their ancestors diverged in the Carboniferous Period over 300 million years ago. Around 6,400 extant species of mammals have been described and divided into 29 orders.
Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a pouch. Living marsupials include opossums, Tasmanian devils, kangaroos, koalas, wombats, wallabies, and bandicoots among others, while many extinct species, such as the thylacine, are also known.
Xenarthra is a major clade of placental mammals native to the Americas. There are 31 living species: the anteaters, tree sloths, and armadillos. Extinct xenarthrans include the glyptodonts, pampatheres and ground sloths. Xenarthrans originated in South America during the late Paleocene about 60 million years ago. They evolved and diversified extensively in South America during the continent's long period of isolation in the early to mid Cenozoic Era. They spread to the Antilles by the early Miocene and, starting about 3 Mya, spread to Central and North America as part of the Great American Interchange. Nearly all of the formerly abundant megafaunal xenarthrans became extinct at the end of the Pleistocene.
Placental mammals are one of the three extant subdivisions of the class Mammalia, the other two being Monotremata and Marsupialia. Placentalia contains the vast majority of extant mammals, which are partly distinguished from monotremes and marsupials in that the fetus is carried in the uterus of its mother to a relatively late stage of development. The name is something of a misnomer considering that marsupials also nourish their fetuses via a placenta, though for a relatively briefer period, giving birth to less developed young which are then nurtured for a period inside the mother's pouch.
Eomaia is a genus of extinct fossil mammals containing the single species Eomaia scansoria, discovered in rocks that were found in the Yixian Formation, Liaoning Province, China, and dated to the Barremian Age of the Lower Cretaceous about 125 million years ago. The single fossil specimen of this species is 10 centimetres (3.9 in) in length and virtually complete. An estimate of the body weight is 20–25 grams (0.71–0.88 oz). It is exceptionally well-preserved for a 125-million-year-old specimen. Although the fossil's skull is squashed flat, its teeth, tiny foot bones, cartilages and even its fur are visible.
Eutheria is the clade consisting of all therian mammals that are more closely related to placentals than to marsupials.
Afrotheria is a clade of mammals, the living members of which belong to groups that are either currently living in Africa or of African origin: golden moles, elephant shrews, tenrecs, aardvarks, hyraxes, elephants, sea cows, and several extinct clades. Most groups of afrotheres share little or no superficial resemblance, and their similarities have only become known in recent times because of genetics and molecular studies. Many afrothere groups are found mostly or exclusively in Africa, reflecting the fact that Africa was an island continent from the Cretaceous until the early Miocene around 20 million years ago, when Afro-Arabia collided with Eurasia.
Theria is a subclass of mammals amongst the Theriiformes. Theria includes the eutherians and the metatherians but excludes the egg-laying monotremes and various extinct mammals evolving prior to the common ancestor of placentals and marsupials.
Euarchontoglires is a clade and a superorder of mammals, the living members of which belong to one of the five following groups: rodents, lagomorphs, treeshrews, primates, and colugos.
Zalambdalestes was a eutherian mammal, most likely not a placental due to the presence of an epipubic bone, living during the Upper Cretaceous in Mongolia.
Laurasiatheria is a superorder of placental mammals that groups together true insectivores (eulipotyphlans), bats (chiropterans), carnivorans, pangolins (pholidotes), even-toed ungulates (artiodactyls), odd-toed ungulates (perissodactyls), and all their extinct relatives. From systematics and phylogenetic perspectives, it is subdivided into order Eulipotyphla and clade Scrotifera. It is a sister group to Euarchontoglires with which it forms the magnorder Boreoeutheria. Laurasiatheria was discovered on the basis of the similar gene sequences shared by the mammals belonging to it; no anatomical features have yet been found that unite the group, although a few have been suggested such as a small coracoid process, a simplified hindgut and allantoic vessels that are large to moderate in size. The Laurasiatheria clade is based on DNA sequence analyses and retrotransposon presence/absence data. The superorder originated on the northern supercontinent of Laurasia, after it split from Gondwana when Pangaea broke up. Its last common ancestor is supposed to have lived between ca. 76 to 90 million years ago.
Ferae is a mirorder of placental mammals from grandorder Ferungulata, that groups together clades Pan-Carnivora and Pholidotamorpha.
Boreoeutheria is a magnorder of placental mammals that groups together superorders Euarchontoglires and Laurasiatheria. With a few exceptions male animals in the clade have a scrotum, an ancestral feature of the clade. The sub-clade Scrotifera was named after this feature.
Ferungulata is a grandorder of placental mammals that groups together mirorder Ferae and clade Pan-Euungulata. It has existed in two guises, a traditional one based on morphological analysis and a revised one taking into account more recent molecular analyses. The Fereungulata is a sister group to the order Chiroptera (bats) and together they make clade Scrotifera.
Cimolestes is a genus of early eutherians with a full complement of teeth adapted for eating insects and other small animals. Paleontologists have disagreed on its relationship to other mammals, in part because quite different animals were assigned to the genus, making Cimolestes a grade taxon of animals with similar features rather than a genus of closely related ones. Fossils have been found in North America, South America, Europe and Africa. Cimolestes first appeared during the Late Cretaceous of North America. According to some paleontologists, Cimolestes died out at the start of the Paleocene, while others report the genus from the early Eocene.
Maelestes is a prehistoric shrew-like mammal discovered in 1997 in the Gobi Desert. The animal lived in the late Cretaceous Period, around 71-75 million years ago, and was a contemporary of dinosaurs such as Velociraptor and Oviraptor. According to some scientists, the discovery and analysis of this species suggests that true placental mammals appeared near the time the non-avian dinosaurs became extinct 66 million years ago, not much earlier in the Cretaceous as thought by others. However, the presence of an epipubic bone, among other characteristics, place it as a non-placental eutherian.
Cladotheria is a clade of mammals. It contains modern therian mammals and several extinct groups, such as the "dryolestoids", amphitheriids and peramurids. The clade was named in 1975 by Malcolm McKenna. In 2002, it was defined as a node-based taxon containing "the common ancestor of dryolestids and living therians, plus all its descendants". A different, stem-based definition was given in 2013, in which Cladotheria contains all taxa that are closer to Mus musculus than to the "symmetrodont" Spalacotherium tricuspidens.
Monotremes are mammals of the order Monotremata. They are the only group of living mammals that lay eggs, rather than bearing live young. The extant monotreme species are the platypus and the four species of echidnas. Monotremes are typified by structural differences in their brains, jaws, digestive tract, reproductive tract, and other body parts, compared to the more common mammalian types. Although they are different from almost all mammals in that they lay eggs, like all mammals, the female monotremes nurse their young with milk.
Artiofabula is a clade made up of the Suina and the Cetruminantia. The clade was found in molecular phylogenetic analyses and contradicted traditional relationships based on morphological analyses.
Scrotifera is a clade of placental mammals that groups together grandorder Ferungulata, clade Apo-Chiroptera, other extinct members and their common ancestors. The clade Scrotifera is a sister group to the order Eulipotyphla based on evidence from molecular phylogenetics, and together they make superorder Laurasiatheria. The last common ancestor of Scrotifera is supposed to have diversified ca. 73.1 to 85.5 million years ago.
 | This article about a mammal is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |