Siluriformes are considered as primarily freshwater and have frequently been a model for the study of historical biogeography. Among catfishes, the most diverse clade is the Loricarioidei, a Neotropical group for which the fossil record extends back to the Palaeocene of Argentina. Here we describe a fossil from the early Late Cretaceous of Morocco, exhibiting typical morphological traits of the Loricariidae. A phylogenetic analysis integrating morphological characters with a multigene database for the main loricarioid lineages and outgroups highly supports inclusion of the fossil within the Loricariidae. A time-calibrated analysis corroborates the origin of loricarioids at about 112 MYA. The presence of this loricariid in Africa provides evidence that loricarioids have diversified before the separation of Africa and South America. The Moroccan loricariid shows an ancient evolutionary history that, in Africa, ended in the Late Cretaceous but persisted in South America, later surviving the K/Pg extinction.

中文翻译：

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撒哈拉化石和冈瓦纳新热带装甲鲶鱼的黎明

鲶形目被认为主要是淡水动物，经常成为历史生物地理学研究的模型。在鲶鱼中，最多样化的分支是 Loricarioidei，这是一个新热带类群，其化石记录可以追溯到阿根廷的古新世。在这里，我们描述了摩洛哥晚白垩世早期的化石，表现出 Loricariidae 的典型形态特征。将形态特征与主要 Loricarioid 谱系和外群的多基因数据库相结合的系统发育分析高度支持该化石包含在 Loricariidae 中。时间校准分析证实了 loricarioid 的起源于大约 112 MYA。这种变色龙在非洲的存在提供了证据，表明变色龙在非洲和南美洲分离之前就已经多样化。摩洛哥的 loricariid 显示了古老的进化历史，在非洲，它结束于白垩纪晚期，但在南美洲持续存在，后来在 K/Pg 灭绝中幸存下来。