Sinosauropterygidae

Sinosauropterygidae Temporal range: Early Cretaceous, Barremian–Albian PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Holotype specimen of Sinosauropteryx prima , Inner Mongolia Museum
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Clade:	Dinosauria
Clade:	Saurischia
Clade:	Theropoda
Clade:	Coelurosauria
Family:	† Sinosauropterygidae Ji & Ji, 1996
Genera
† Huadanosaurus † Huaxiagnathus † Mirischia ? † Sinocalliopteryx † Sinosauropteryx

Sinosauropterygidae is an extinct family of coelurosaurian theropod dinosaurs mainly known from the Early Cretaceous Jehol Biota of China.

History

Originally named in 1996, this family was erected as a monotypic family containing Sinosauropteryx . ^[1] Although it was later thought to be synonymous with the family Compsognathidae, several researchers subsequently argued against the putative monophyly of compsognathids. Some recovered Compsognathidae as a paraphyletic group of coelurosaurian theropods, ^[2] while others recovered it as a polyphyletic group and argued that some characteristics supporting the supposed monophyly of this family might be ontogenetically variable, since most taxa assigned to Compsognathidae are known from juveniles. ^{[3] [4] [5]} Qiu et al. (2025) also argued against the monophyly of Compsognathidae and supported the validity of Sinosauropterygidae in their description of the second species of Sinosauropteryx and the new genus of sinosauropterygid Huadanosaurus . ^[6]

Classification

The family Sinosauropterygidae was originally placed within Aves as a family of the proposed order Sinosauropterygiformes. ^[1] Qiu et al. (2025) revised the definition of the monophyletic Sinosauropterygidae within Coelurosauria as a family containing all compsognathid-like theropods from the Jehol Biota of China: Sinosauropteryx , Huadanosaurus , Huaxiagnathus and Sinocalliopteryx . In all of their phylogenetic analyses reproduced below, Mirischia from Brazil was also recovered as a member of this family: ^[6]

Topology A: OSP dataset ^[5]

Sinosauropterygidae Sinosauropteryx lingyuanensis Sinosauropteryx prima Huaxiagnathus orientalis Huadanosaurus sinensis Mirischia asymmetrica Sinocalliopteryx gigas Tyrannosauroidea Other maniraptoriforms

Topology B: TWiG dataset ^[7]

Tyrannosauroidea Sinosauropterygidae Mirischia asymmetrica Huaxiagnathus orientalis Sinocalliopteryx gigas Juravenator starki Huadanosaurus sinensis Compsognathus longipes Sinosauropteryx lingyuanensis Sinosauropteryx prima Other maniraptoriforms

References

1. Ji, Q.; Ji, S. (1996). "On the discovery of the earliest bird fossil in China (Sinosauropteryx gen. nov.) and the origin of birds" (PDF). Chinese Geology. 10 (233): 30–33.
2. Hendrickx, Christophe; Mateus, Octávio (2014). "Abelisauridae (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Late Jurassic of Portugal and dentition-based phylogeny as a contribution for the identification of isolated theropod teeth". Zootaxa. 3759: 1–74. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3759.1.1. PMID   24869965. S2CID   12650231.
3. Rauhut, Oliver W. M.; Foth, Christian; Tischlinger, Helmut; Norell, Mark A. (17 July 2012). "Exceptionally preserved juvenile megalosauroid theropod dinosaur with filamentous integument from the Late Jurassic of Germany". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 109 (29): 11746–11751. Bibcode:2012PNAS..10911746R. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1203238109 . PMC   3406838 . PMID   22753486.
4. Rauhut, Oliver W.M.; Foth, Christian (2020-03-11). "3 – The Origin of Birds: Current Consensus, Controversy, and the Occurrence of Feathers". In Foth, Christian; Rauhut, Oliver W.M. (eds.). The Evolution of Feathers: From Their Origin to the Present. Springer Nature. pp. 27–45. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-27223-4_3. ISBN   978-3-030-27223-4. S2CID   216372010.
5. Cau, Andrea (2024). "A Unified Framework for Predatory Dinosaur Macroevolution" (PDF). Bollettino della Società Paleontologica Italiana. 63 (1): 1–19. doi:10.4435/BSPI.2024.08 (inactive 2024-11-20). ISSN   0375-7633.
6. Qiu, Rui; Wang, Xiaolin; Jiang, Shunxing; Meng, Jin; Zhou, Zhonghe (2025-02-22). "Two new compsognathid-like theropods show diversified predation strategies in theropod dinosaurs". National Science Review. doi: 10.1093/nsr/nwaf068 . ISSN   2095-5138.
7. Brusatte, Stephen L.; Lloyd, Graeme T.; Wang, Steve C.; Norell, Mark A. (2014-10-20). "Gradual Assembly of Avian Body Plan Culminated in Rapid Rates of Evolution across the Dinosaur-Bird Transition". Current Biology . 24 (20): 2386–2392. Bibcode:2014CBio...24.2386B. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2014.08.034. PMID   25264248.