An international team of paleontologists found fossilized bones of Pampaphoneus biccai, or pampaphonea, one of the oldest carnivores that lived in South America 265 million years ago, in southern Brazil. To work published In the scientific journal Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society (ZJLS).
Scientists discovered a perfectly preserved skull, ribs and front paw bones.
Pampaphones belonged to an early group of therapsids (primitive mammals and their relatives) called dinocephalans. Before extinction, dinocephalans were one of the main groups of large land animals. The heyday of Pampaphoneans and others like them occurred at the end of the Paleozoic era, 40 million years before the beginning of the age of dinosaurs.
According to professor Felipe Pinheiro of the Federal University of Pampa, this discovery was key to gaining insight into the community structure of terrestrial ecosystems shortly before the greatest mass extinction of all time.
Scientists noted that 265 million years ago, pampaphones played the same ecological role as modern lions or tigers. They were the largest known land predators of their time, capturing their prey with their large, sharp teeth and biting through bones with their powerful jaws.
According to the researchers, the largest specimens of Pampaphoneus reached almost three meters in length and weighed about 400 kg.
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