Typhlonectidae Taylor, 1968

Class: Amphibia > Order: Gymnophiona > Family: Typhlonectidae
14 species

Typhlonectidae Taylor, 1968, Caecilians of the World: xi, 231. Type genus: Typhlonectes Peters, 1880 "1879".

Potamotyphloidea Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 169. Type genus: Potamotyphlus Taylor, 1968. Coined as an epifamily. Synonymy by Wilkinson, San Mauro, Sherratt, and Gower, 2011, Zootaxa, 2874: 3.

Potamotyphlidae — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 169. Family.

Potamotyphlinae — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 169. Subfamily.

Potamotyphlilae — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 169. Infrafamily.

Potamotyphlini — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 169. Tribe.

Typhlonectoides — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 169. Hyperfamily.

Typhlonectoidae — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 170. Epifamily.

Typhlonectinae — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 170. Hedges, Nussbaum, and Maxson, 1993, Herpetol. Monogr., 7: 64-76. Subfamily of Caeciliidae; this rejected by Wilkinson, 1996, J. Herpetol., 30: 413-415, for reason of not resolving paraphyly of Caeciliidae (sensu stricto).

Typhlonectilae — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 170. Infrafamily.

Typhlonectoidi — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 170. Supertribe.

Pseudotyphlonectini Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 170. Type genus: Pseudotyphlonectes Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986. Coined as a tribe. Synonymy by Wilkinson, San Mauro, Sherratt, and Gower, 2011, Zootaxa, 2874: 3.

Typhlonectini — Lescure, Renous, and Gasc, 1986, Mem. Soc. Zool. France, 43: 170. Tribe.

Typhlonectina — Dubois, Ohler, and Pyron, 2021, Megataxa, 5: 269. Subtribe. 

English Names

Aquatic Caecilians (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 26).

Distribution

South America.

Comment

Taylor, 1969, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 48: 585-687, suggested that Typhlonectidae (Typhlonectinae of this catalog) was derived from an ancestor morphologically similar to Ichthyophiidae. Wake, 1977, J. Herpetol., 11: 379-386, suggested that Typhlonectidae was derived from a viviparous group of Caeciliidae, a contention not refuted by Nussbaum, 1979, Occas. Pap. Mus. Zool. Univ. Michigan, 687. Wilkinson, 1991, Z. Zool. Syst. Evolutionsforsch., 29: 304-311, presented further evidence for the paraphyly of Caeciliidae with respect to Typhlonectidae. See also discussion by Lavilla and Cei, 2001, Monogr. Mus. Reg. Sci. Nat. Torino, 28: 12-13. Wilkinson, 1989, Herpetologica, 45: 23-36, suggested a phylogeny of the genera. Recognized by Hedges, Nussbaum, and Maxson, 1993, Herpetol. Monogr., 7: 64-76, as a monophyletic crown-group derived from within a paraphyletic Caeciliinae. Wilkinson, 1996, J. Herpetol., 30: 413-415, provided a revised key to the genera. Wilkinson and Nussbaum, 1999, Zool. J. Linn. Soc., 126: 191-223, suggested a phylogeny of typhlonectids: (((Potamotyphlus + Atretochoana) Typhlonectes) Nectocaecilia) Chthonerpeton. Wilkinson, 1997, Biol. Rev. Cambridge Philos. Soc., 72: 423-470, discussed relationship of the group on the basis of traditional and neuroanatomical morphological data and suggested that it is imbedded within Caeciliidae. Wilkinson, Loader, Gower, Sheps, and Cohen, 2003, Afr. J. Herpetol., 52: 83-92, suggested that typhlonectines are the sister taxon of Caecilia from among the taxa they studied. Frost, Grant, Faivovich, Bain, Haas, Haddad, de Sá, Channing, Wilkinson, Donnellan, Raxworthy, Campbell, Blotto, Moler, Drewes, Nussbaum, Lynch, Green, and Wheeler, 2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 297: 168, recognized Typhlonectinae as a monophyletic subfamily within Caeciliidae, but did not recognize a coordinate Caeciliinae, which would have been paraphyletic. Wilkinson and Nussbaum, 2006, In Exbrayat (ed.), Reprod. Biol. Phylog. Gymnophiona: 39-78, discussed evidence for this taxon (as Typhlonectidae). Wilkinson, San Mauro, Sherratt, and Gower, 2011, Zootaxa, 2874: 41-64, recognized Typhlonectidae within a larger monophyletic taxonomy of caecilians. Pyron and Wiens, 2011, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 61: 543-583 (see comment in Amphibia record) on the basis of molecular evidence and sampling of only Chthonerpeton and Typhlonectes suggested via their tree that the Typhlonectidae may be paraphyletic with respect to Caeciliidae (sensu stricto), although this is probably an artifact of sampling (e.g., Potamotyphlus, Atretochoana, and Nectocaecilia were not included) and the non-inclusion of the morphological apomorphies of Typhlonectidae (DRF). Blackburn and Wake, 2011, In Zhang (ed.), Zootaxa, 3148: 39-55, briefly reviewed the taxonomic history of this taxon. Maddin, Russell, and Anderson, 2012, Zool. J. Linn. Soc., 166: 160-201, reported on the braincase of the family and confirmed its placement as the sister taxon of Caeciliidae. Vitt and Caldwell, 2014, Herpetology, 4th Ed., provided a summary of range, diagnosis, life history, and taxonomy. Maciel, Sampaio, Hoogmoed, and Schneider, 2017, Zool. Scripta, 46: 255–263, reported on the phylogenetics of the genera based on morphology and molecules. Dubois, Ohler, and Pyron, 2021, Megataxa, 5: 1–738, treated Typhlonectidae as a subtribe of a very enlarged Caeciliidae, although the reason for this modification was unclear. 

Contained taxa (14 sp.):

Atretochoana Nussbaum and Wilkinson, 1995 (1 sp.)
Chthonerpeton Peters, 1880 (9 sp.)
Nectocaecilia Taylor, 1968 (1 sp.)
Potomotyphlus Taylor, 1968 (1 sp.)
Typhlonectes Peters, 1880 (2 sp.)

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