Antarctanax, the Antarctic king

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A new archosaur from the Early Triassic period of Antarctica has been described and named Antarctanax shackltoni ("Shackleton's Antartic king"). The genus name originates from its continent of discovery (Antarctica) and the meaning of its classification, archosaur ("ruling reptile"), while its scientific name comes from Ernest Shackleton, a British Antarctic explorer who named the Beardmore Glacier, which is located nearby the site where the fossil was discovered, Graphite Peak. This animal's discovery provides more evidence that the Antarctica of the Triassic had a much more temperate climate than it does today, although it did still experience the midnight sun and polar nights. It's discovery is also interesting in that it isn't found in the Karoo Supergroup in South Africa, with other animals from these rocks not being found in the Beacon Supergroup where the new animal was discovered, despite both rock formations being of similar ages, the fact that the Karoo is one of the best studied fossil sites in the world, and the fact that other archosaurs, like Prolacerta, have been found in both locations, which shows that the diversity of Antarctica during this time was vastly different from elsewhere in the world. As the third Early Triassic archosaur found in the region, following Prolacerta and another as of yet unnamed animal, it also reveals the extent of archosaur diversity immediately following the Great Dying. Here is an image of the fossils used to describe the genus, along with a reconstruction of the animal by artist Adrienne Stroup of the Field Museum (Antarctanax is the animal in the foreground).





Paper (open access!): https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02724634.2018.1536664

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This is a cool find, thanks for sharing. In addition to being a good artist, Ms. Stroup helps manage the paleontology collections at the Field.