Poposauroids (Pseudosuchia; Paracrocodylomorpha) are one of several lineages of ecologically unique archosauriform reptiles that diversified throughout the Triassic Period. Fossils of the poposauroid lineages Shuvosauridae and Poposaurus are well known from Late Triassic deposits across western Pangaea, represented by abundant materials in the southwestern United States in the Chinle Formation and the Dockum Group and rarer occurrences in the Ischigualasto Formation of Argentina. However, Late Triassic records of these lineages are currently unknown in other parts of Pangaea. Here, we extend the geographic range of Late Triassic poposauroids by reporting two incomplete femora from the Newark Supergroup of the eastern United States. Both specimens are from the Chatham Group of North Carolina, the first (NCSM 27054) from a quarry near Wadesboro in Anson County (Cumnock Formation), and the second (AMNH FR 24431) from a quarry near Gulf in Chatham County (Pekin Formation). Both possess diagnostic character states of Poposauroidea and the more complete specimen, NCSM 27054, lacks character states of shuvosaurids. We conclude that these femora represent poposauroids similar (if not identical) to Poposaurus gracilis among known taxa in the clade. Our findings expand the Late Triassic range of Poposauroidea into the central/eastern Pangaean Atlantic rift zone. NCSM 27054 and AMNH FR 24431 may represent some of the oldest Late Triassic poposauroid fossils and help fill a gap in the stratigraphic range of Poposauroidea.

For the first time, a large assemblage of uncompressed ammonites from the Cordatum Zone (Lower Oxfordian) has been collected from the top of the Sengenthal Formation, Franconian Alb. The ammonites were recovered from a condensed iron-oolitic and glauconitic conglomeratic bed, here designated the Wolfsbach-Bank, which unconformably overlies Bathonian iron-oolitic marls. The bed contains Cardioceras cordatum (Sowerby), Proscaphites paturattensis (Greppin), Neocampylites delmontanus (Oppel), Euaspidoceras freii (Jeannet), Mirosphinctes niedzwiedzkii (Siemiradzki), Protophites christoli (Beaudouin) and further perisphinctid ammonites, which have previously not or rarely been described from Southern Germany. One Macrocephalites sp. indicates additional reworked components from Lower or Middle Callovian sediments. This condensed bed, characterized by iron-rich stromatolitic crusts devoid of cyanobacteria, bears a resemblance to the Schellenbrücke-Bank in N Switzerland, with respect to its ammonite assemblage and sedimentology. The uppermost part of the overlying bed represents a discontinuity widespread in Europe and may have been formed during transgression and lag sedimentation following a sea-level lowstand during that submarine erosion took place.

Skeletal palaeopathological alterations of pycnodonts are mainly concentrated in the bones of the caudal pedicel region (caudal fin excluded). In this study, a case series of 27 pycnodont specimens belonging to eleven genera ranging from the Late Triassic to the Early Eocene are examined, and an anatomical and topographical classification of these anomalies is presented. In 25 of the described specimens (i.e. 93%) the anomalies also include the presence of supernumerary rays of the dorsal fin and/or the anal fin. This abnormal condition alters the ratio between the number of dermal rays and the number of the pterygiophores, which in Neopterygii is invariably one-to-one. The presence of supernumerary rays, therefore, re-creates in abnormal pycnodonts the typical arrangement of the basal Actinopterygii (i.e., non-neopterygian Actinopterygii), in which two or more dermal rays are articulated to each pterygiophore. Therefore, the described anomalies can be interpreted as atavisms. From a phylogenetic point of view, the presence of this type of atavism supports the view that pycnodonts are basal neopterygians.

In the area of the Middle Swabian Alb the Blaukalk Member of the Wedelsandstein Formation is dated in the newly introduced arenata Biohorizon (Laeviuscula Subzone, Laeviuscula Zone, Lower Bajocian) except for locally occurring rock lenses in its top. For its nominal index, Sonninia arenata (Quenstedt, 1886), we here designate a lectotype. Both these rock lenses and the “Blaukalkabraum Bed” (“Abraumschichten”) at the basis of the above following Giganteuston Formation are assigned to the in the Middle Swabian Alb biostratigraphically incomplete Sauzei Zone (Lower Bajocian, pseudocontrahens Biohorizon). The respective ammonite assemblages are briefly reported. We demonstrate that the Blaukalk Member of the Middle Swabian Alb and the “Korallenschichten” of OPPEL and Quenstedt in the Hohenzollern area are different in age, in contrast to the opinions of these authors. The positions of the Laeviuscula/Sauzei and Sauzei/Humphriesianum zonal boundaries are discussed and reviewed. The Sauzei Zone is divided in its type area (Swabian Alb) into the Triplicatus and Macrum subzones. The Pinguis Subzone is transferred from the Humphriesianum Zone to the Sauzei Zone and synonymized with the Hebridica Subzone.