New gobiconodontid (Eutriconodonta, Mammalia) from the Lower Cretaceous Shahai and Fuxin formations, Liaoning, China

摘要: Eutriconodontans are one of the key members of mammals to our understanding of the evolution and transition of mammalian fauna in Asia during the Cretaceous. Two gobiconodontid and two triconodontid species have previously been reported from the upper Lower Cretaceous Shahai and Fuxin formations. Here we describe two additional eutriconodontans from the formations, Fuxinoconodon changi gen. et sp. nov. and ?Gobiconodontidae gen. et sp. indet. This new species is attributed to the Gobiconodontidae, characterized by having an enlarged first lower incisor, reduction in the number of incisors and premolariforms, proportionally large cusps b and c being well distant from cusp a on the molariforms, presence of a labial cingulid, and a unique mixed combination of molariform characters seen on either the first or the second, but not both, generations of molariforms in Gobiconodon. Together with the four known species, eutriconodontans remained diverse to some extent in the late Early Cretaceous in Asia, although their family-level and generic level diversity appears to have been already reduced at that time.