LEPTOCHARIIDAE Gray, 1851

Adnet, Sylvain, Marivaux, Laurent, Cappetta, Henri, Charruault, Anne-Lise, Essid, El Mabrouk, Jiquel, Suzanne, Ammar, Hayet Khayati, Marandat, Bernard, Marzougui, Wissem, Merzeraud, Gilles, Temani, Rim, Vianey-Liaud, Monique & Tabuce, Rodolphe, 2020, Diversity and renewal of tropical elasmobranchs around the Middle Eocene Climatic Optimum (MECO) in North Africa: New data from the lagoonal deposits of Djebel el Kébar, Central Tunisia, Palaeontologia Electronica (a 38) 23 (2), pp. 1-62 : 18

Family LEPTOCHARIIDAE Gray, 1851

This family of barbeled houndshark is currently monotypic with the living Leptocharias smithii Müller and Henle, 1838 , which inhabits the tropical eastern Atlantic coasts from Mauritania to Namibia. The Leptochariidae are recorded since the Late Cretaceous (Underwood and Ward, 2008) but the tooth morphology of its first representatives is quite different from that of the living species (illustrated by Herman et al., 1991). In contrast, the Middle-Late Eocene representatives share very similar tooth morphology and heterodonty with the living representative.