Anguidae (Alifanov, 2000)

Conrad, J. L., 2008, Phylogeny And Systematics Of Squamata (Reptilia) Based On Morphology, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2008 (310), pp. 1-182 : 112

Carusioidea + Anguidae

(figs. 54D, 55D, 56C)

DIAGNOSIS: The current phylogenetic hypothesis suggests a sister-group relationship between carusioids and anguids based on 69(0) absence of parietal tabs on the frontal, 285(2) symphysial portion of the pubis more than half again as long as the tubercular portion, and 351(1) absence of the M. adductor mandibulae.

COMMENTS: Caldwell (1999a) recently recovered support for a monophyletic clade including xenosaurids and anguids in a clade roughly corresponding with the traditional usage of Anguioidea ( McDowell and Bogert, 1954; Romer, 1956; Carroll, 1988b; Uetz, 2007). Importantly, analysis of a preliminary version of this data set did not recover a carusioid-anguid clade ( Conrad, 2005a), nor did other recent osteological studies ( Wu et al., 1996; Evans and Barbadillo, 1997, 1998; Gao and Norell, 1998; Lee, 1998, 2000, 2005a; Evans and Barbadillo, 1999; Conrad, 2004b, 2006b; Evans and Wang, 2005; Evans et al., 2005;). Importantly, Townsend (2002) offered preliminary results of an analysis based on molecular data supporting a similar hypothesis, published in full by Townsend et al. (2004). Although these analyses find Heloderma as the sister-taxon to Anguidae , a hypothesis not supported by the present morphological data set, they did consistently recover a clade containing Xenosaurus and Anguidae to the exclusion of Shinisaurus and Varanidae in their maximum-likelihood trees.

The greater taxonomic and character sampling of the present study as compared to previous morphological analyses suggests greater credibility of the current phylogenetic hypothesis. This is bolstered by a general similarity between the phylogenetic topology supported by molecular data. Even so, the monophyly of the carusioid-anguid taxon and of Varanoidea should be further analyzed.