Čerňanský Andrej, Daza Juan D, Smith Richard, Bauer Aaron M, Smith Thierry, Folie Annelise
Department of Ecology, Laboratory of Evolutionary Biology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University in Bratislava, Mlynská dolina, Bratislava 84215, Slovakia.
Department of Biological Sciences, Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, TX, USA.
R Soc Open Sci. 2022 Jun 29;9(6):220429. doi: 10.1098/rsos.220429. eCollection 2022 Jun.
We here describe a new gekkotan lizard from the earliest Eocene (MP 7) of the Dormaal locality in Belgium, from the time of the warmest global climates of the past 66 million years (Myr). This new taxon, with an age of 56 Myr, together with indeterminate gekkotan material reported from Silveirinha (Portugal, MP 7) represent the oldest Cenozoic gekkotans known from Europe. Today gekkotan lizards are distributed worldwide in mainly warm temperate to tropical areas and the new gecko from Dormaal represents a thermophilic faunal element. Given the Palaeocene-Eocene thermal maximum at that time, the distribution of this group in such northern latitudes (above 50° North - the latitude of southern England) is not surprising. Although this new gekkotan is represented only by a frontal (further, dentaries and a mandibular fragment are described here as Gekkota indet. 1 and 2-at least two gekkotan species occurred in Dormaal), it provides a new record for squamate diversity from the earliest Eocene 'greenhouse world'. Together with the Baltic amber gekkotan , they document the northern distribution of gekkotans in Europe during the Eocene. The increase in temperature during the early Eocene led to a rise in sea level, and many areas of Eurasia were submerged. Thus, the importance of this period is magnified by understanding future global climate change.
我们在此描述一种来自比利时多尔马尔地区始新世最早期（MP 7）的新壁虎科蜥蜴，其所处时代为过去6600万年（Myr）中全球气候最温暖的时期。这个新分类单元距今5600万年，与在葡萄牙西尔维林哈报道的未确定的壁虎科材料（MP 7）一起，代表了欧洲已知最古老的新生代壁虎科动物。如今，壁虎科蜥蜴主要分布在全球温暖的温带至热带地区，来自多尔马尔的新壁虎代表了一种喜温动物区系成分。鉴于当时的古新世 - 始新世极热事件，该类群在如此高的北纬地区（北纬50°以上——英格兰南部的纬度）分布并不令人惊讶。尽管这种新的壁虎科动物仅由一块额骨代表（此外，齿骨和一块下颌骨碎片在此被描述为未确定的壁虎科1和2——多尔马尔至少出现了两种壁虎科物种），但它为最早始新世“温室世界”的有鳞目动物多样性提供了新记录。与波罗的海琥珀中的壁虎科动物一起，它们记录了始新世期间壁虎科动物在欧洲的北部分布情况。始新世早期温度升高导致海平面上升，欧亚大陆许多地区被淹没。因此，通过了解未来全球气候变化，这一时期的重要性被放大了。
