An ancestral turtle from the Late Triassic of southwestern China

Chun Li (), Xiao-Chun Wu (), Olivier Rieppel, Li-Ting Wang and Li-Jun Zhao
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Chun Li: Laboratory of Evolutionary Systematics of Vertebrates, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of SciencesPO Box 643, Beijing 100044, China
Xiao-Chun Wu: Canadian Museum of Nature, PO Box 3443, Station D, Ottawa, Ontario K1P 6P4, Canada
Olivier Rieppel: The Field Museum, 1400 South Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois 60605-2496, USA
Li-Ting Wang: Geological Survey of Guizhou Province
Li-Jun Zhao: Zhejiang Museum of Nature History

Nature, 2008, vol. 456, issue 7221, 497-501

Abstract: Turning turtle: how proto-turtles gained a shell A well preserved 220-million-year-old fossil from marine deposits of the Late Triassic of Guizhou in southwest China sheds light on the intermediate steps in the acquisition of the unique turtle body-plan. Transitional forms are scarce in this lineage, making this transition one of the mysteries of reptile evolution. The find is the most primitive turtle known. It has a fully developed plastron, the ventral dermal armour, evolved before the carapace, the dorsal (upper) part of the shell structure. In this fossil the carapace consists of neural plates only. This suggest that the carapace developed via ossification of the neural plates and broadening of the ribs — a sequence that echoes the developmental pattern in young turtles today.

Date: 2008
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DOI: 10.1038/nature07533

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