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Prism Size in Tooth Enamel of Some Late Cretaceous Mammals and Its Value in Multituberculate Taxonomy
Author(s) -
FOSSE GISLE,
ESKILDSEN ØYVIN,
RISNES STEINAR,
SLOAN ROBERT E.
Publication year - 1978
Publication title -
zoologica scripta
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.204
H-Index - 64
eISSN - 1463-6409
pISSN - 0300-3256
DOI - 10.1111/j.1463-6409.1978.tb00588.x
Subject(s) - cretaceous , enamel paint , biology , prism , paleontology , taxonomy (biology) , systematics , zoology , anatomy , dentistry , optics , physics , medicine
Teeth from specified members of the two suborders of Late Cretaceous Multituberculata and two Late Cretaceous therians were studied. The enamel was prismatic on all teeth. In the therian representatives and the representatives of the suborder Ptilodontoidea of the Multituberculata, the prism diameters and densities per unit area were similar to those of recent mammals. In the representatives of the suborder Taeniolabidoidea the prisms were very large and their density per unit area was 5 to 8 times lower than in recent mammals. It is suggested that gigantoprismatic enamel is a characteristic of Taeniolabidoidea and could be used as a taxonomic criterion in multituberculate systematics.