古生物學(xué)家揭示了地球歷史上“最危險”的位置

古生物學(xué)家揭示了地球歷史上“最危險”的位置

With enormous, flying predatory reptiles, dinosaurs, and crocodile-like hunters once roaming the landscape, 100 million years ago, the Sahara was the most dangerous place on the planet, according to palaeontologists.

據(jù)古生物學(xué)家說，1億年前，撒哈拉沙漠是地球上最危險的地方，到處都是體型龐大、會飛的掠食性爬行動物、恐龍和像鱷魚一樣的獵人。

Madison Dapcevich

Located along the border of Morocco and Algeria is the Kem Kem Group, a well-documented and highly fossiliferous rock formation that holds records of Earth’s lifeforms spanning tens of millions of years. Here, the fossilized remains of cartilaginous and bony fishes, turtles, pterosaurs, dinosaurs, as well as plants and trace fossils have been documented by palaeontologists for decades. The Kem Kem Formation has an unusually high amount of large-bodied carnivores and captures the diversity of northern Africa better than any other assemblage found from the continent.

位于摩洛哥和阿爾及利亞邊界的是Kem Kem群，這是一個有大量記錄的化石巖層，保存著地球上數(shù)千萬年的生命形式的記錄。在這里，軟骨和硬骨魚類、海龜、翼龍、恐龍以及植物和微量化石的化石遺跡已經(jīng)被古生物學(xué)家記錄了幾十年。Kem Kem組擁有數(shù)量異常龐大的大型食肉動物，比在該大陸發(fā)現(xiàn)的任何其他組合都能更好地捕捉到北非的多樣性。

Publishing their work in Zookeys, an international team of scientists compared decades’ worth of expedition notes and records from Kem Kem, as well as reviewed data sets of fossil records housed in museums around the world. The result is what researchers call the “most comprehensive piece of work on fossil vertebrates from the Sahara in almost a century,” and provides insights into the location and date of when and where they think was the most dangerous place to be in the history of Earth.

一個國際科學(xué)家團(tuán)隊在Zookeys上發(fā)表了他們的研究成果，他們比較了幾十年來Kem Kem的探險筆記和記錄，以及世界各地博物館收藏的化石記錄的數(shù)據(jù)集。研究人員稱這一成果是“近一個世紀(jì)以來對撒哈拉沙漠脊椎動物化石最全面的研究”，并提供了他們認(rèn)為地球歷史上最危險的地方的位置和日期。

Continental red beds at the Aoufous Formation have offered up fossils of a wide range of creatures. Ibrahim et al., 2020, Zookeys

During the Cretaceous period, the area surrounding Kem Kem was once home to a vast river system home to different species of aquatic and terrestrial animals. The fossils indicate at least three of the largest predatory dinosaurs ever documented, including the 8-meter-long saber-toothed Carcharodontosaurus and the similarly sized Deltadromeus raptor, as well as pterosaurs – which are basically giant flying crocodiles, roamed there.

在白堊紀(jì)時期，Kem Kem周圍的地區(qū)曾經(jīng)是一個巨大的河流系統(tǒng)，是各種水生和陸生動物的家園。這些化石表明，至少有三種記錄在案的最大的食肉恐龍，包括8米長的劍齒虎Carcharodontosaurus和同樣大小的Deltadromeus raptor，以及翼龍——它們基本上是在那里游蕩的巨型飛行鱷魚。

“This was arguably the most dangerous place in the history of planet Earth, a place where a human time-traveler would not last very long,” said lead author Dr Nizar Ibrahim, an Assistant Professor of Biology at the University of Detroit Mercy, in a statement.

“這可能是地球行星歷史上最危險的地方，在這里，人類時間旅行者不會持續(xù)很長時間，”該研究的第一作者、底特律大學(xué)生物學(xué)助理教授尼扎爾·易卜拉欣博士在一份聲明中說。

Just as terrifying as the giant animals that roamed the landscape were the animals that they preyed upon – huge, terrifyingly monstrous fish.

和在這片土地上游蕩的巨型動物一樣可怕的是它們捕食的動物——巨大、可怕的怪魚。

"This place was filled with absolutely enormous fish, including giant coelacanths and lungfish. The coelacanth, for example, is probably four or even five times large than today's coelacanth. There is an enormous freshwater saw shark called Onchopristis with the most fearsome of rostral teeth, they are like barbed daggers, but beautifully shiny,” said study co-author Professor David Martill from the University of Portsmouth.

“這個地方到處都是巨大無比的魚，包括巨大的腔棘魚和肺魚。例如，腔棘魚可能比今天的腔棘魚大四到五倍。有一種叫做Onchopristis的巨大的淡水鋸鰩，它有著最可怕的夜北側(cè)牙齒，它們就像有刺的匕首，但閃閃發(fā)光。”

The authors add that the review "provides a window into Africa's Age of Dinosaurs."

作者補充說，這篇綜述“為了解非洲的恐龍時代打開了一扇窗”。

Dragonfly larva (Odonata indet) from the Douira Formation. Scale bar equals 5 mm. Zookeys

Serenoichthys kemkemensis seen in 1999 at the Douira Formation. Scale bar equals 1 cm. Zookeys

Decapod prawn Cretapenaeus berberus from Oum Tkout, Douira Formation. Scale bar equals 5 mm. Zookeys

The geographical setting of the Kem Kem region and outcrops (A). A view of the position of Morocco in Africa and the location of the Kem Kem beds (shown in red). A map (B) showing the geographical location of the Kem Kem in North Africa relative to roughly coeval sites in northern Africa. Cretaceous outcrops along with the Kem Kem and Guir Hamadas (C). Zookeys