Pakicetus (meaning 'whale from Pakistan') is an extinct genus of amphibious cetacean of the family Pakicetidae, which was endemic to Indian Subcontinent during the Ypresian (early Eocene) period, about 50 million years ago. [2]

2013年8月7日 · First discovered by paleontologists in 1983, Pakicetus lived along the margins of a large shallow ocean, the Tethys Sea. Although it had the body of a land animal, its head had the distinctive long skull shape of a whale’s.

Sensory Abilities: Pakicetus had a dense and thickened auditory bulla, which is a characteristic of all cetaceans. The bulla is the bone of the skull that formed the floor of a cavity that housed the middle ear ossicles (the malleus, incus, and stapes).

Pakicetus inachus from the early Eocene of Pakistan is the oldest and most primitive cetacean known. The dentition of Pakicetus resembles that of carnivorous mesonychid land mammals as well as middle Eocene cetaceans.

Pakicetus, extinct genus of early cetacean mammals known from fossils discovered in 48.5-million-year-old river delta deposits in present-day Pakistan. Pakicetus is one of the earliest whales and the first cetacean discovered with functional legs.

2011年10月3日 · Though not directly ancestral to walking whales such as Pakicetus, the animal exhibited a suite of transitional features which hint that whales got their start as semi-aquatic omnivores or...

In this paper we describe a new genus and species of archaeocete cetacean, Pakicetus inachus, based on a partial cranium and dental remains found in the bone bed at Chorlakki. The locality and fauna known to date are discussed in Gingerich et al. …

1981年1月1日 · Pakicetus has a dense tympanic bulla with a characteristically cetacean sigmoid process (Gingerich and Russell 1981), but the periotic was firmly integrated in the basicranium, making directional...

Among the archeocetes, the recently described lower Eocene Pakicetus inachus obviously represents an early stage of adaptation to aquatic life. The morphology of the incomplete cranial remains, however, gives no evidence that Pakicetus was an amphibious intermediate stage.

Pakicetus inachus, A New Archaeocete (Mammalia, Cetacea) from the Early-Middle Eocene Kuldana Formation of Kohat (Pakistan) Gingerich, Philip D.; Russell, Donald E. 1981