A brand new genus and species of early-diverging oviraptorosaurian dinosaur has been known from two specimens present in Inside Mongolia, China.
Existence reconstruction of Yuanyanglong bainian. Symbol credit score: Sci.Information / Ddinodan.
“Oviraptorosauria is a bunch of specialised pennaraptoran theropods identified basically from an considerable Asian and North American Cretaceous fossil document,” stated Dr. Xing Xu, a paleontologist from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology at Chinese language Academy of Sciences and the Centre for Vertebrate Evolutionary Biology at Yunnan College, and associates.
“In recent times, a chain of recent discoveries have enriched our wisdom in their range, behaviors, ontogeny and reproductive biology.”
“With over 40 genera named, unquestionable oviraptorosaurs come with the earliest-diverging species similar to Incisivosaurus and Caudipterygidae from northeastern China, and extremely specialised edentulous species similar to Avimimus from the Gobi Wasteland, Oviraptoridae from jap Asia and Caenagnathidae from Asia and North The united states, with maximum identified species being from the Past due Cretaceous.”
The brand new oviraptorosaur species lived in what’s now China all through the Early Cretaceous, some 110 million years in the past.
Named Yuanyanglong bainian, it presentations a singular aggregate of morphological options distinguishing it from all up to now identified oviraptorosaurs.
“Yuanyanglong bainian will also be known as an oviraptorosaur in response to the quick and deep cranium in addition to a number of pelvic characters (i.e. a midway-placed triangular obturator procedure at the ischium and a just about ventrally-directed lengthy pubis),” the paleontologists stated.
“Amongst oviraptorosaurs, alternatively, Yuanyanglong bainian presentations distinctive aggregate of options now not shared by way of up to now identified clades, such because the hooked posterior technique of the pubic boot which is longer than the rounded anterior procedure.”
Two articulated skeletons of Yuanyanglong bainian, together with a partial cranium and a few postcranial bones, have been accumulated in the summertime of 2021 from the Maortu locality of the Miaogou Formation in Chilantai, western Inside Mongolia, China.
The invention provides the primary Early Cretaceous oviraptorosaur document close to the Gobi Wasteland, and offers further insights into the biology and ecology of early-diverging oviraptorosaurs.
“This new species is intermediate in morphology between the earliest-diverging and late-diverging oviraptorosaurs, and our phylogenetic research helps it as a sister taxon to the clade shaped by way of Avimimidae and Caenagathoidea,” the researchers stated.
“Significantly, this new early-diverging oviraptorosaur has an ilium with an especially brief postacetabular procedure and hindlimbs with proportionally elongate and fused decrease segments, a personality aggregate unknown amongst different oviraptorosaurs however commonplace in wading birds, suggesting a possible ecology involving wading.”
“Preserved gastroliths very similar to Caudipteryx counsel a gastric mill serve as in our new species, and our initial observations point out doable discrepancies within the digestion mode of early- and late-diverging oviraptorosaurs.”
The group’s findings have been printed within the magazine Cretaceous Analysis.
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Mingze Hao et al. A brand new oviraptorosaur from the Decrease Cretaceous Miaogou Formation of western Inside Mongolia, China. Cretaceous Analysis, printed on-line October 24, 2024; doi: 10.1016/j.cretres.2024.106023
