Prionochelys is an extinct genus of pancheloniid from the Mooreville Chalk and Eutaw Formations of Alabama. It consists of a single species, P. matutina.[1]
| Prionochelys Temporal range:
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|---|---|
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Order: | Testudines |
| Suborder: | Cryptodira |
| Genus: | †Prionochelys |
| Species: | †P. matutina
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| Binomial name | |
| †Prionochelys matutina Zangerl, 1953
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Taxonomy
editPrionochelys was originally assigned to the family Toxochelyidae.[1] A 2018 paper found it to be on the stem of Cheloniidae, the family to which most modern sea turtles belong, forming a monophyletic grouping with Ctenochelys and Peritresius.[2] In 2019, Gentry et al. assigned Prionochelys to the extinct Ctenochelyidae family. A cladogram from their analysis:[3]
| Pan-Chelonioidea | |
References
edit- ^ a b R, Zangerl (1953). "The vertebrate fauna of the Selma Formation of Alabama. Part 3. The turtles of the family Protostegidae. Part 4. The turtles of the family Toxochelyidae". Fieldiana Geology Memoirs. 3: 61–277.
- ^ Gentry, Andrew D. (2018-11-01). "Prionochelys matutina Zangerl, 1953 (Testudines: Pan-Cheloniidae) from the Late Cretaceous of the United States and the evolution of epithecal ossifications in marine turtles". PeerJ. 6: e5876. doi:10.7717/peerj.5876. ISSN 2167-8359. PMC 6215699. PMID 30402356.
- ^ Andrew D. Gentry; Jun A. Ebersole; Caitlin R. Kiernan (2019). "Asmodochelys parhami, a new fossil marine turtle from the Campanian Demopolis Chalk and the stratigraphic congruence of competing marine turtle phylogenies". Royal Society Open Science. 6 (12): Article ID 191950. Bibcode:2019RSOS....691950G. doi:10.1098/rsos.191950. PMC 6936288. PMID 31903219.