Acta Palaeontologica Polonica

New ischnacanthiform jaw bones from the Lower Devonian of Podolia, Ukraine

Victor Voichyshyn and Hubert Szaniawski

Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 63 (2), 2018: 327-339 doi:https://doi.org/10.4202/app.00456.2018

Investigation of fish fauna assemblages obtained by dissolution of calcareous rock samples from Early Devonian marine deposits of Podolia revealed new material of ischnacanthiform jaw bones. One family Podoliacanthidae fam. nov. and two new genera and species, Drygantacanthus semirotunda gen. et sp. nov. and Kasperacanthus serratus gen. et sp. nov., are established. The new family is based on one main key feature, the presence of denticle groups of  Podoliacanthus type situated on the lingual tooth row. The family comprises three genera, Podoliacanthus, Drygantacanthus gen. nov., and Kasperacanthus gen. nov., as well as one new form undetermined to generic level. Another new form described in open nomenclature displays the remains of the most powerful known jaws among Podolian ischnacanthids known to now. The new forms have diverse main teeth morphology, which probably reflect differentiated hunting methods.

Key words: Acanthodii, Ischnacanthiformes, dentigerous jaw bone, Devonian, Lochkovian, Podolia.

Victor Voichyshyn [victor@smnh.org], State Museum of Natural History NASU, Teatralna Str. 18, 79008, L’viv, Ukraine. Hubert Szaniawski [szaniaw@twarda.pan.pl], Institute of Paleobiology, Polish Academy of Sciences, ul. Twarda 51/55, 00-818 Warszawa, Poland.


This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (for details please see creativecommons.org), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.