Alain Phélizon's scientific contributions

... The fossil record of Varanidae, although still very incomplete, demonstrates a great diversity across most of the Cenozoic and a wide geographic distribution, encompassing broad areas that are currently well outside the range of extant forms, such as North America and Europe Molnar, 2004), including a form with anatomical and physiological adaptations unique among tetrapods: the re-evolution of a fourth eye from the pineal organ (Smith et al., 2018). In fact, the varanid fossil record is far richer in Europe than on any other continent, spanning from the earliest Eocene up to the Middle Pleistocene (Augé, 2005;Augé et al., 2022;Fejérváry, 1918Fejérváry, , 1935Georgalis et al., 2017Hoffstetter, 1969;Villa et al., 2018). The richness of the European fossil record is likely due to intensive sampling effort, reflecting a long history of palaeontological discoveries, with the first European varanid fossils recovered and described already during the 1860s (Gaudry, 1862(Gaudry, -1867; see details in Georgalis, 2019). ...

... However, Hyaenodictis lived only during a short period in Europe: the genus disappeared from Europe at the end of the Ypresian. Solé et al. (2019) noted that a turnover (named Ypresian-Lutetian Mammal Turnover) seems to have occurred at the end of the Ypresian. However, this turnover must be deeply investigated in the future in order to characterize the European ecosystem dynamics through the Paleogene. ...

... P. cookei (UM 87990 "C," "F," and "G"), P. tricuspidens (MNHN R 613 and Pellouin CM 104 from the Pellouin collection), and the Le Quesnoy plesiadapid ("A," "B," "C," and "D"). The Le Quesnoy plesiadapid refers to a new, largely undescribed species of Plesiadapis (originally referred to as the Creil Platycheorops; Godinot et al. 1998;Jehle et al. 2019) from the Le Quesnoy locality of the Paris Basin (Godinot et al., in prep.). Paromomyidae is represented by Ignacius clarkforkensis (UM 108210). ...

... M. Barbatodon oardaensis, right p4 UBB Ng2-01, Negoiu (site RM2), Rusca Montană Basin (from Codrea et al., 2017a). N. Barbatodon transylvanicus, left Jehle et al., 2012), or else multituberculates disappeared altogether with the advent of the more derived, modern placental orders (e.g., Smith et al., 2014), following an important dispersal-related faunal turnover near the Paleocene-Eocene boundary (e.g., Hooker and Collinson, 2012;De Bast and Smith, 2017). ...