A new Late Cretaceous iguanomorph from North America and the origin of New World Pleurodonta (Squamata, Iguania).

Iguanomorpha (stem + crown Iguania) is a diverse squamate clade with members that predominate many modern American lizard ecosystems. However, the temporal and palaeobiogeographic origins of its constituent crown clades (e.g. Pleurodonta (basilisks, iguanas, and their relatives)) are poorly constrained, mainly due to a meagre Mesozoic-age fossil record. Here, we report on two nearly complete skeletons from the Late Cretaceous (Campanian) of North America that represent a new and relatively large-bodied and possibly herbivorous iguanomorph that inhabited a semi-arid environment. The new taxon exhibits a mosaic of anatomical features traditionally used in diagnosing Iguania and non-iguanian squamates (i.e. Scleroglossa; e.g. parietal foramen at the frontoparietal suture, astragalocalcaneal notch in the tibia, respectively). Our cladistic analysis of Squamata revealed a phylogenetic link between Campanian-age North American and East Asian stem iguanomorphs (i.e. the new taxon + Temujiniidae). These results and our evaluation of the squamate fossil record suggest that crown pleurodontans were restricted to the low-latitude Neotropics prior to their early Palaeogene first appearances in the mid-latitudes of North America.

Shifts in food webs and niche stability shaped survivorship and extinction at the end-Cretaceous.

It has long been debated why groups such as non-avian dinosaurs became extinct whereas mammals and other lineages survived the Cretaceous/Paleogene mass extinction 66 million years ago. We used Markov networks, ecological niche partitioning, and Earth System models to reconstruct North American food webs and simulate ecospace occupancy before and after the extinction event. We find a shift in latest Cretaceous dinosaur faunas, as medium-sized species counterbalanced a loss of megaherbivores, but dinosaur niches were otherwise stable and static, potentially contributing to their demise. Smaller vertebrates, including mammals, followed a consistent trajectory of increasing trophic impact and relaxation of niche limits beginning in the latest Cretaceous and continuing after the mass extinction. Mammals did not simply proliferate after the extinction event; rather, their earlier ecological diversification might have helped them survive.