Data from: A new global palaeobiogeographical model for the late Mesozoic and early Tertiary

Late Mesozoic palaeobiogeography has been characterized by a distinction between the northern territories of Laurasia and the southern landmasses of Gondwana. The repeated discovery of Gondwanan lineages in Laurasia has led to the proposal of alternative scenarios to explain these anomalous occurrences. A new biogeographical model for late Mesozoic terrestrial ecosystems is here proposed, in which Europe and ‘Gondwanan’ territories possessed a common Eurogondwanan fauna during the earliest Cretaceous. Subsequently, following the Hauterivian, Europe severed from Africa and connected to Asiamerica resulting in a faunal interchange. This model explains the presence of ‘Gondwanan’ taxa in Laurasia and the absence of Laurasian forms in the southern territories during the Cretaceous. In order to test this new palaeobiogeographical model, tree reconciliation analyses (TRAs) were performed based on biogeographical signals provided by a supertree of late Mesozoic archosaurs. The TRAs found significant evidence for the presence of an earliest Cretaceous Eurogondwanan fauna, followed by a relatively short-term Gondwana-Laurasia dichotomy. The analysis recovered evidence for a biogeographical re-connection of the European territories with Africa and South America-Antarctica during the Campanian to Maastrichtian time-slice. This biogeographical scenario appears to continue through the early Tertiary and sheds light on the trans-Atlantic disjunct distributions of several extant plant and animal groups.晚中生代古生物地理学的典型特征为劳亚大陆（Laurasia）北部陆块与冈瓦纳大陆（Gondwana）南部陆块之间的显著分异。多次在劳亚大陆中发现冈瓦纳演化支的化石记录，催生了多种用于解释这类异常产出现象的替代假说。本文提出一种适用于晚中生代陆地生态系统的全新生物地理模型：早白垩世最早期，欧洲与“冈瓦纳型”陆块曾共享一套欧冈瓦纳动物群；豪特里维阶之后，欧洲与非洲脱离并与亚美大陆（Asiamerica）相连，由此开启了跨区域动物群交流。该模型可合理解释白垩纪时期劳亚大陆中“冈瓦纳型”类群的存在，以及南部陆块中劳亚型类群缺失的现象。为验证这一新古生物地理模型，研究人员基于晚中生代主龙类（archosaurs）超树所携带的生物地理信号，开展了树和解分析（Tree Reconciliation Analyses, TRAs）。分析结果显示，早白垩世最早期确实存在欧冈瓦纳统一动物群，随后出现了一段相对短暂的冈瓦纳-劳亚分异格局；研究还发现，在坎潘阶至马斯特里赫特阶时段内，欧洲陆块与非洲、南美洲-南极洲陆块发生了生物地理层面的重新连接。这一生物地理格局延续至早第三纪，为阐明多个现存动植物类群的跨大西洋间断分布格局提供了关键依据。