Single Tooth Sheds Light on Early African Diversity

Fossil vertebrates from the early Cenozoic of sub-saharan Africa are known from only a handful of sites. In this month's Journal of Paleontology, Nancy Stevens and colleagues describe a single tooth of an endemic family of African rodents called Phiomyidae. It comes from a new microvertebrate site in southwestern Tanzania from the Rukwa Rift Basin, and is believed to be middle Eocene to early Oligocene in age. Phiomyid rodents are best known from Eocene and Oligocene deposits in Egypt. This specimen demonstrates other early Cenozoic fossil vertebrates from sub-saharan Africa maybe forthcoming.

Stevens, N.J., O'Connor, P., Gottfried, M.D., Roberts, E.M., Ngasala, S., and Dawson, M.R. 2006. Metaphiomys (Rodentia: Phiomyidae) from the Paleogene of southwestern Tanzania. Journal of Paleontology 80(2):407-409.