English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

Acanthomorph teleosts (spiny-rayed fishes) account for approximately a third of extant vertebrate species. They appeared during the Late Cretaceous and have been a major component of aquatic biodiversity since the early Cenozoic. They occupy today most trophic levels and ecological niches in aquatic environments, however very little is known about those that were adopted by the earliest representatives of the group. Here, we report on an exceptional glimpse into the ecological diversity of early spiny-rayed fishes provided by the unusual preservation of a newly discovered specimen of the freshwater acanthomorph  Spinocaudichthys  from the Upper Cretaceous of Morocco. A combination of major-to-trace elemental mapping methods reveals that the gross morphology of the specimen’s intestine has been remarkably preserved owing to the rapid mineralization of iron hydroxides around it. Differing with the typically short and straight intestinal tract of carnivorous teleosts, the intestine in  Spinocaudichthys  is long and highly convoluted, indicating a probable herbivorous diet. Acanthomorphs would therefore have conquered various ecological niches in their early evolutionary history, prior to their subsequent phylogenetic diversification in both marine and freshwater environments that followed the K-Pg extinction event.

scientific reports

Exceptional preservation of a Cretaceous intestine provides a glimpse of the early ecological diversity of spiny-rayed fishes (Acanthomorpha, Teleostei)