Platinx Explained

Platinx is an extinct genus of marine ray-finned fish that inhabited the northern Tethys Ocean during the early to middle Eocene.^[1] It was the last surviving member of the ancient order Crossognathiformes, which was a dominant and successful group throughout the preceding Mesozoic era.^[2]

It contains a single species, P. macropterus, whose remains are primarily known from the late Ypresian-aged rocks of Monte Bolca, Italy.^[3] However, specimens have also been recovered from the earliest-Ypresian Danata Formation of Turkmenistan (sometimes placed in their own distinct species, P. cognitus Daniltshenko, 1968, although these do not appear to be distinct enough from P. macropterus),^[4] as well as incomplete remains from the middle Eocene of Syria.^[5] The extinct bonytongues Monopteros and Thrissopterus, which co-occur with Platinx in Monte Bolca, were for a time briefly reclassified as a species of Platinx (P. gigas), although they are now known to be distinct.^[6]

Notes and References

1. Sepkoski . Jack . A compendium of fossil marine animal genera . Bulletins of American Paleontology . 364 . 560 . 2002 . 2009-02-27 .
2. Arratia . Gloria . Tischlinger . Helmut . 2010 . The first record of Late Jurassic crossognathiform fishes from Europe and their phylogenetic importance for teleostean phylogeny . Fossil Record . en . 13 . 2 . 317–341 . 10.1002/mmng.201000005 . 1860-1014. free .
3. Carnevale . G. . Bannikov . Alexandre F. . Marramà . G. . Tyler . James C. . Zorzin. . R. . 2014 . The Bolca Fossil-Lagerstätte: A window into the Eocene World. 5. The Pesciara- Monte Postale Fossil-Lagerstätte: 2. Fishes and other vertebrates. Excursion guide . Rendiconti della Società Paleontologica Italiana . 4 . 1 . i–xxvii . 10088/25678.
4. Taverne . Louis . 1980 . Ostéologie et position systématique du genre Platinx (Pisces, Teleostei) de l'éocène du Monte Bolca (Italie) . Bulletins de l'Académie Royale de Belgique . 66 . 1 . 873–889 . 10.3406/barb.1980.58746.
5. Book: Muséum national d'histoire naturelle (France) . Notes et mémoires sur le Moyen-Orient . naturelle (France) . Muséum national d'histoire . 1959 . Muséum national d'histoire naturelle . t.7 (1959) . Paris.
6. Book: Geology, British Museum (Natural History) Department of . Catalogue of the Fossil Fishes in the British Museum (Natural History): Actinopterygian Teleostomi of the suborders Isospondyli (in part), Ostariophysi, Apodes, Percesoces, Hemibranchii, Acanthopterygii, and Anacanthini . Woodward . Arthur Smith . 1901 . order of the Trustees . en.