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Science 29 July 1994:
Vol. 265. no. 5172, pp. 639 - 642
DOI: 10.1126/science.265.5172.639
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Articles

A Devonian Tetrapod from North America

Edward B. Daeschler 1, Neil H. Shubin 2, Keith S. Thomson 3, and William W. Amaral 4

1 Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19103-1195 and Department of Geology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6316, USA.
2 Department of Biology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6017, USA.
3 Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19103-1195, USA.
4 Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.

An early tetrapod fossil from the Upper Devonian of Pennsylvania (Catskill Formation) extends the temporal range of tetrapods in North America and suggests that they attained a virtually global equatorial distribution by the end of the Devonian. Derived features of the shoulder girdle indicate that appendicular mechanisms of support and propulsion were well developed even in the earliest phases of tetrapod history. The specialized morphology of the pectoral skeleton implies that the diversity of early tetrapods was great and is suggestive of innovative locomotor patterns in the first tetrapods.

Submitted on March 16, 1994
Accepted on May 31, 1994


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