Kévin Le Verger

Paleontological Institute and Museum - University of Zurich - Switzerland

The El Jobo projectile points represent a distinctive ballistic innovation of Late Pleistocene Neotropical groups. This technology, characterized by its fusiform/lanceolate shape, has been recorded mainly in northwestern Venezuela in a variety of geographical areas and in association with megafauna killing/butchering sites. To address its significa...

The horse (Equus caballus) varieties from Skyros and Rhodes islands (Greece) in the Aegean archipelago are extremely small, reaching shoulder heights of only about 1 m. Furthermore, the Japanese archipelago is home to eight small, native horse breeds. We investigated the evolutionary morphology and provided a review of historical documentations of...

Allometry, i.e., morphological variation correlated with size, is a major pattern in organismal evolution. Since size varies both within and among species, allometry occurs at different variational levels. However, the variability of allometric patterns across levels is poorly known since its evaluation requires extensive comparative studies. Here,...

With their odd cranial features, glyptodonts, closely related to extant armadillos, are a highly diverse group of the South American megafauna. Doedicurus, Glyptodon, Panochthus, and Neosclerocalyptus were present in the “Pampean Formation” during the Pleistocene, and they are all exceptionally preserved in the Santiago Roth Collection, thus oferin...

New postcranial elements of two mesonychids that lived during the Ypresian (early Eocene) in Europe are here described. The postcranial bones found at La Borie (France; ≈MP8 + 9) can be confidently ascribed to Hyaenodictis raslanloubatieri, while the astragalus found at Palette (France; ≈MP7) probably represents H. rougierae. Our study demonstrates...

The present 3D Dataset contains the 3D models analyzed in the following publication: Le Verger K., González Ruiz L.R., Billet G. 2021. Comparative anatomy and phylogenetic contribution of intracranial osseous canals and cavities in armadillos and glyptodonts (Xenarthra, Cingulata). Journal of Anatomy 00: 1-30 p. https://doi.org/10.1111/joa.13512

Unlabelled: The present work concerns xenarthrans from the collection of Santiago (Kaspar Jakob) Roth (1850-1924) housed at the Palaeontological Institute and Museum of the University of Zurich, one of the most important collections of Pleistocene mammals from Argentina in Europe. Roth was a paleontologist originally from Switzerland who prospecte...

The rise of Carnivora (Mammalia: Laurasiatheria) is an important evolutionary event that changed the structure of terrestrial ecosystems, starting at the dawn of the Eocene, 56 Mya. This radiation has been mainly analysed in North America, leaving the evolution of carnivoran diversity in other regions of the globe poorly known. To tackle this issue...

The evolutionary history of the Cingulata, as for many groups, remains a highly debated topic to this day, particularly for one of their most emblematic representatives: the glyptodonts. There is no consensus among morphological and molecular phylogenies regarding their position within Cingulata. As demonstrated by recent works, the study of the in...

The evolutionary history of the Cingulata, as for many groups, remains a highly debated topic to this day, particularly for one of their most emblematic representatives: the glyptodonts. There is no consensus among morphological and molecular phylogenies relative to their position within Cingulata. As demonstrated by recent works, the study of the...

Morphological variation is a complex phenomenon whose use in phylogenetic analyses is often criticized. Many studies have called for a broader exploration of patterns of morphological variation and a better identification of the covariation among traits to improve morphological phylogenetics. Cingulates represent an ideal case study for this object...

A large part of extant and past mammalian morphological diversity is related to variation in size through allometric effects. Previous studies suggested that craniofacial allometry is the dominant pattern underlying mammalian skull shape variation, but cranial allometries were rarely characterized within cranial units such as individual bones. Here...

The Quercy Phosphorites Formation in France is world famous for its Eocene to Miocene faunas, especially those from the upper Eocene to lower Oligocene, the richest of all. The latter particularly helped to understand the ‘Grande Coupure’, a dramatic faunal turnover event that occurred in Europe during the Eocene-Oligocene transition. Fossils from...

The Paleogene mammals of Europe are rarely known from partial or complete skeletons. As a result, their systematics and ecology are often solely based on dental characters and postcranial remains, when available, are usually neglected. This explains why the locomotion of mammals of the Eocene-Oligocene transition, the “Grande Coupure”, is poorly kn...

Amphicyonidae Trouessart, 1885 are among the oldest known carnivoran groups, with the oldest representatives in Europe belonging to the genus CynodictisBravard & Pomel, 1850. This genus, discovered in the middle of the 19th century, presents a particularly confusing taxonomic history. Early on it was subject to taxonomic inflation, but now its dive...

We present new species of an enigmatic family of mammals, which is endemic to Europe, the Paroxyclaenidae: Merialus bruneti sp. nov., Fratrodon tresvauxi gen. et sp. nov., Paraspaniella gunnelli gen. et sp. nov., and Sororodon tresvauxae gen. et sp. nov. The fossils described come from six localities of the Ypresian of the Paris Basin (France): Pou...

The present 3D Dataset contains the 3D model analyzed in the following publication: Soí e et al. (2018), Niche partitioning of the European carnivorous mammals during the paleogene. Palaios. https://doi.org/10.2110/palo.201 8.022

We here describe the first partial cranium of Hyaenodon leptorhynchus, the type species of the taxonomically diverse and widely distributed hypercarnivorous genus Hyaenodon (Hyaenodonta). The cranium is from the Se ́on Saint-Andre ́ deposits (Marseille, France; Chattian, MP26). It is preserved in a dense red marl matrix that obscures key morphologi...