Spondylosoma is a genus of avemetatarsalian archosaur belonging to the clade Aphanosauria from the late Ladinian-age Middle Triassic Lower Santa Maria Formation in Paleorrota Geopark, Brazil.
Lewisuchus is a genus of archosaur that lived during the Late Triassic. As a silesaurid dinosauriform, it was a member of the group of reptiles most commonly considered to be the closest relatives of dinosaurs. Lewisuchus was about 1 metre (3.3 ft) long. Fossils have been found in the Chañares Formation of Argentina. It exhibited osteoderms along its back.
Teleocrater is a genus of avemetatarsalian archosaur from the Middle Triassic Manda Formation of Tanzania. The name was coined by English paleontologist Alan Charig in his 1956 doctoral dissertation, but was only formally published in 2017 by Sterling Nesbitt and colleagues. The genus contains the type and only species T. rhadinus. Uncertainty over the affinities of Teleocrater have persisted since Charig's initial publication; they were not resolved until Nesbitt et al. performed a phylogenetic analysis. They found that Teleocrater is most closely related to the similarly enigmatic Yarasuchus, Dongusuchus, and Spondylosoma in a group that was named the Aphanosauria. Aphanosauria was found to be the sister group of the Ornithodira, the group containing dinosaurs and pterosaurs.
Dinosauromorpha is a clade of avemetatarsalians that includes the Dinosauria (dinosaurs) and some of their close relatives. It was originally defined to include dinosauriforms and lagerpetids, with later formulations specifically excluding pterosaurs from the group. Birds are the only dinosauromorphs which survive to the present day.
Avemetatarsalia is a clade of diapsid reptiles containing all archosaurs more closely related to birds than to crocodilians. The two most successful groups of avemetatarsalians were the dinosaurs and pterosaurs. Dinosaurs were the largest terrestrial animals for much of the Mesozoic Era, and one group of small feathered dinosaurs has survived up to the present day. Pterosaurs were the first flying vertebrates and persisted through the Mesozoic before dying out at the Cretaceous-Paleogene (K-Pg) extinction event. Both dinosaurs and pterosaurs appeared in the Triassic Period, shortly after avemetatarsalians as a whole. The name Avemetatarsalia was first established by British palaeontologist Michael Benton in 1999. An alternate name is Pan-Aves, or "all birds", in reference to its definition containing all animals, living or extinct, which are more closely related to birds than to crocodilians.
Yarasuchus is an extinct genus of avemetatarsalian archosaur that lived during the Anisian stage of the Middle Triassic of India. The genus was named and described in 2005 from a collection of disarticulated but fairly complete fossil material found from the Middle Triassic Yerrapalli Formation. The material is thought to be from two individuals, possibly three, with one being much more complete and articulated than the other. The type and only species is Y. deccanensis. Yarasuchus was a quadruped roughly 2–2.5 metres (6.6–8.2 ft) long, with an elongated neck and tall spines on its vertebrae. Unlike other quadrupedal Triassic reptiles, the limbs and shoulders of Yarasuchus were slender, and more like those of ornithodirans.
Sterling Nesbitt is an American paleontologist best known for his work on the origin and early evolutionary patterns of archosaurs. He is currently an associate professor at Virginia Tech in the Department of Geosciences.
Mandasuchus is an extinct genus of loricatan pseudosuchian from the Manda Formation of Tanzania, which dates back to the Anisian stage of the Middle Triassic. Although this genus was first mentioned by Alan Charig in 1956, a formal description was not published until 2018.
Asilisaurus ; from Swahili, asili, and Greek, σαυρος is an extinct genus of silesaurid archosaur. The type species is Asilisaurus kongwe. Asilisaurus fossils were uncovered in the Manda Beds of Tanzania and date back to the early Carnian, making it one of the oldest known members of the Avemetatarsalia. It was the first non-dinosaurian dinosauriform recovered from Africa. The discovery of Asilisaurus has provided evidence for a rapid diversification of avemetatarsalians during the Middle Triassic, with the diversification of archosaurs during this time previously only documented in pseudosuchians.
Lagerpetidae is a family of basal avemetatarsalians. Though traditionally considered the earliest-diverging dinosauromorphs, fossils described in 2020 suggest that lagerpetids may instead be pterosauromorphs. Lagerpetid fossils are known from the Triassic of Argentina, Arizona, Brazil, Madagascar, New Mexico, and Texas. They were typically small, although some lagerpetids, like Dromomeron gigas and a specimen from the Santa Rosa Formation attributed to Dromomeron sp., were able to get quite large. Lagerpetid fossils are rare; the most common finds are bones of the hindlimbs, which possessed a number of unique features.
Stenaulorhynchus is an extinct genus of hyperodapedontid rhynchosaur known from the Middle Triassic deposits of Tanganyika Territory, Tanzania. It was found in the Lifua Member of the Manda Formation in the Karoo Supergroup. It was named and first described by Sidney Henry Haughton in 1932. The type species is Stenaulorhynchus stockleyi, a beaked herbivore measuring 1–6 meters in length.
Diodorus is a genus of silesaurid dinosauromorph that lived during the Late Triassic in what is now Morocco. Fossils were discovered in the Timezgadiouine Formation of the Argana Basin, and were used to name the new genus and species Diodorus scytobrachion. The genus name honors the mythological king Diodorus and the ancient historian Diodorus Siculus; the specific name is ancient Greek for 'leathery arm' and also honors the mythographer Dionysius Scytobrachion. The holotype specimen is a partial dentary bone (front of the lower jaw), and assigned specimens include isolated teeth, two humeri (upper arm bones), a metatarsal (foot bone), and femur (thigh bone).
The Manda Formation is a Middle Triassic (Anisian?) or possibly Late Triassic (Carnian?) geologic formation in Tanzania. It preserves fossils of many terrestrial vertebrates from the Triassic, including some of the earliest dinosauromorph archosaurs. The formation is often considered to be Anisian in age according to general tetrapod biochronology hypotheses and correlations to the Cynognathus Assemblage Zone of South Africa. However, some recent studies cast doubt to this age, suggesting that parts deposits may actually be younger (Carnian) in age.
Epipophyses are bony projections of the cervical vertebrae found in archosauromorphs, particularly dinosaurs. These paired processes sit above the postzygapophyses on the rear of the vertebral neural arch. Their morphology is variable and ranges from small, simple, hill-like elevations to large, complex, winglike projections. Epipophyses provided large attachment areas for several neck muscles; large epipophyses are therefore indicative of a strong neck musculature.
Francis Rex Parrington was a British vertebrate palaeontologist and comparative anatomist at the University of Cambridge. A Fellow of the Royal Society, he was director of the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology and past president of the zoology section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science.
Lutungutali is an extinct genus of silesaurid dinosauriform from the Middle Triassic of Zambia. The single type species of the genus is Lutungutali sitwensis. Lutungutali was named in 2013 and described from a fossil specimen, holotype NHCC LB32, including hip bones and tail vertebrae. The specimen was collected in 2009 from the upper Ntawere Formation, which dates to the Anisian stage of the Middle Triassic. Lutungutali is the first known silesaurid from Zambia and, along with the Tanzanian silesaurid Asilisaurus and dinosauriform Nyasasaurus, the oldest bird-line archosaur known from body fossils.
Asperoris is an extinct genus of archosauriform reptile known from the Middle Triassic Manda Beds of southwestern Tanzania. It is the first archosauriform known from the Manda Beds that is not an archosaur. However, its relationships with other non-archosaurian archosauriforms are uncertain. It was first named by Sterling J. Nesbitt, Richard J. Butler and David J. Gower in 2013 and the type species is Asperoris mnyama. Asperoris means "rough face" in Latin, referring to the distinctive rough texture of its skull bones.
The Usili Formation is a Late Permian geologic formation in Tanzania. It preserves fossils of many terrestrial vertebrates from the Permian, including temnospondyls, pareiasaurs, therapsids and the archosauromorph Aenigmastropheus.
Nundasuchus is an extinct genus of crurotarsan, possibly a suchian archosaur related to Paracrocodylomorpha. Remains of this genus are known from the Middle Triassic Manda beds of southwestern Tanzania. It contains a single species, Nundasuchus songeaensis, known from a single partially complete skeleton, including vertebrae, limb elements, osteoderms, and skull fragments.
Aphanosauria is an extinct group of reptiles distantly related to dinosaurs. They are at the base of a group known as Avemetatarsalia, one of two main branches of archosaurs. The other main branch, Pseudosuchia, includes modern crocodilians. Aphanosaurs possessed features from both groups, indicating that they are the oldest and most primitive known clade of avemetatarsalians, at least in terms of their position on the archosaur family tree. Other avemetatarsalians include the flying pterosaurs, small bipedal lagerpetids, herbivorous silesaurids, and the incredibly diverse dinosaurs, which survive to the present day in the form of birds. Aphanosauria is formally defined as the most inclusive clade containing Teleocrater rhadinus and Yarasuchus deccanensis but not Passer domesticus or Crocodylus niloticus. This group was first recognized during the description of Teleocrater. Although only known by a few genera, Aphanosaurs had a widespread distribution across Pangaea in the Middle Triassic. They were fairly slow quadrupedal long-necked carnivores, a biology more similar to basal archosaurs than to advanced avemetatarsalians such as pterosaurs, lagerpetids, and early dinosaurs. In addition, they seemingly possess 'crocodile-normal' ankles, showing that 'advanced mesotarsal' ankles were not basal to the whole clade of Avemetatarsalia. Nevertheless, they possessed elevated growth rates compared to their contemporaries, indicating that they grew quickly, more like birds than other modern reptiles. Despite superficially resembling lizards, the closest modern relatives of aphanosaurs are birds.
