Three new monotreme genera from Australia's Lightning Ridge

[Halichoeres]

The famous opalized Lightning Ridge fossils already included several monotremes, but this paper describes three new genera: Opalios, Dharragarra, and Parvopalus. As with other Lightning Ridge mammal fossils, and Mesozoic mammal fossils generally, they're bits of jaw and associated teeth (although, not that many teeth, given that they're monotremes). They also found slightly more of the broken jaw of Steropodon than was previously known.

Here's the jaw of Opalios:

(G and H are the mandibular canal and mental [chin] foramen)

Open access in Alcheringa: https://doi.org/10.1080/03115518.2024.2348753