Researchers have discovered a neglected Jurassic lizard park

A new study published today by researchers at the Instituto Catal de Paleontologia Miquel Crusafont (ICP) and the University of Bristol (UB) on eLife pushes the moment back for Squamata, a group of reptiles that includes lizards, snakes, also lizard worms to law, far. Before the current assessment.

Squamata is the most significant order of reptiles, including lizards, snakes, and worms. Its scales are cold-blooded, and its skin is covered in horny scales. They are a vital component of modern land fauna, especially in warmer climates, with a diversity of more than 10,000 species. However, understanding the evolutionary pathways that forged their success is still poorly understood.

There is agreement that all major squamous groups appeared before the events that destroyed dinosaurs and other reptile groups in the late Mesozoic. However, before this catastrophic global event, during the Cretaceous, many groups of terrestrial tetrapods such as mammals, lizards, and birds appeared to have experienced significant diversification during the so-called Cretaceous Earth Revolution caused by the emergence of flowering plants. 

The scarcity of squamous cell fossils during the Jurassic period suggests that the main explosion of scale evolution occurred during the Cretaceous period (between 145 and 66 Myr.) when their fossil record improved dramatically.

However, a new document published in eLife, led by Arnau Bolet, a paleontologist at the Miquel Crusafont Catal de Paleontology Institute and the University of Bristol, challenges that view and suggests much earlier Squamata transmission. 

Together with University of Bristol colleagues Michael Benton, Tom Stubbs, and Jorge Herrera-Flores, their research concludes that this group of reptiles probably achieved various adaptations long during the Jurassic period (between 201 and 145) before they were believed.

"Although squamous Jurassic species are rare, reconstructed evolutionary trees show that all major squamous cell specialties evolved around this time. It is possible to date adaptations of geckos, iguanas, lizards, worm lizards, and snakes about 50 million years earlier than thought. " differentiate.