Crocodyloidea
Encyclopedia
Crocodyloidea is a superfamily
of crocodilia
ns that evolved in the Late Cretaceous
period. Cladistically
, it is defined as Crocodylus niloticus (the Nile crocodile
) and all crocodylians more closely related to C. niloticus than to either Alligator mississippiensis (the American alligator
) or Gavialis gangeticus (the gharial
).
after Brochu C. A., Njau J., Blumenschine R. J., Densmore L. D. (2010).
Taxonomic rank
In biological classification, rank is the level in a taxonomic hierarchy. Examples of taxonomic ranks are species, genus, family, and class. Each rank subsumes under it a number of less general categories...
of crocodilia
Crocodilia
Crocodilia is an order of large reptiles that appeared about 84 million years ago in the late Cretaceous Period . They are the closest living relatives of birds, as the two groups are the only known survivors of the Archosauria...
ns that evolved in the Late Cretaceous
Late Cretaceous
The Late Cretaceous is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous period is divided in the geologic timescale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous series...
period. Cladistically
Cladistics
Cladistics is a method of classifying species of organisms into groups called clades, which consist of an ancestor organism and all its descendants . For example, birds, dinosaurs, crocodiles, and all descendants of their most recent common ancestor form a clade...
, it is defined as Crocodylus niloticus (the Nile crocodile
Nile crocodile
The Nile crocodile or Common crocodile is an African crocodile which is common in Somalia, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Egypt, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Gabon, South Africa, Malawi, Sudan, Botswana, and Cameroon...
) and all crocodylians more closely related to C. niloticus than to either Alligator mississippiensis (the American alligator
American Alligator
The American alligator , sometimes referred to colloquially as a gator, is a reptile endemic only to the Southeastern United States. It is one of the two living species of alligator, in the genus Alligator, within the family Alligatoridae...
) or Gavialis gangeticus (the gharial
Gharial
The gharial , , also called Indian gavial or gavial, is the only surviving member of the once well-represented family Gavialidae, a long-established group of crocodilians with long, slender snouts...
).
Phylogeny
CladogramCladogram
A cladogram is a diagram used in cladistics which shows ancestral relations between organisms, to represent the evolutionary tree of life. Although traditionally such cladograms were generated largely on the basis of morphological characters, DNA and RNA sequencing data and computational...
after Brochu C. A., Njau J., Blumenschine R. J., Densmore L. D. (2010).