Targaryendraco

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Targaryendraco
Temporal range: Early Cretaceous, 132  Ma
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Targaryendraco.jpg
Holotype mandible
Scientific classification Red Pencil Icon.png
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Order: Pterosauria
Suborder: Pterodactyloidea
Clade: Ornithocheirae
Clade: Targaryendraconia
Family: Targaryendraconidae
Genus: Targaryendraco
Pêgas et al., 2019
Type species
Ornithocheirus wiedenrothi
Wild, 1990
Species
  • T. wiedenrothi
    (Wild, 1990)
Synonyms

Targaryendraco is a genus of pterodactyloid pterosaur from the Early Cretaceous period (Hauterivian stage) of Hannover, northern Germany. Fossil remains of Targaryendraco dated back about 132 million years ago.

Contents

Discovery and naming

In July 1984, amateur paleontologist Kurt Wiedenroth discovered a fragmentary pterosaur skeleton in the clay pit of Engelbostel at the southern edge of the city of Hanover.

In 1990, Rupert Wild described the find as a new species of Ornithocheirus : Ornithocheirus wiedenrothi. The specific name honors Wiedenroth as discoverer. Wild considered the skeleton to lie evolutionary between Ornithocheirus compressirostris (now the holotype of Lonchodectes ) and Ornithocheirus giganteus (now the holotype of Lonchodraco ). [1] O. compressirostris was at the time seen as the type species of Ornithocheirus , but it was meanwhile shown that the correct type species is O. simus. [2]

The holotype, SMNS 56628, was found in rocks of the Stadthagen Formation dating from the earliest Hauterivian, about 132 million years old. It consists of a partial skeleton with lower jaws. It contains the front and the rear of the symphysis of the lower jaws, a right articular, a rib piece, the distal ends of a left radius and ulna, the proximal and distal end of a left third metacarpal and a piece of a phalanx, probably the first of the left third finger. The fossil is part of the collection of the State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart. It is the most complete pterosaur specimen from the Cretaceous of Germany. [3]

In their study of 2010, Fletcher & Salisbury argued for O. wiedenrothi to be an ornithocheirid closely related to the then unnamed Aussiedraco and another pterosaur specimen from the Cretaceous of Australia. [4] In 2013, Ford reported it to be a species of Lonchodectes. [5] In a study of the same year, Rodrigues & Kellner concluded that it wasn't Ornithocheirus, and was also not part of their newly erected genus Lonchodraco. [2] In 2019, Abel et al. argued it to be potential new genus of lonchodectid. [3]

Later in 2019, Pêgas et al. assigned O. wiedenrothi as the type species of Targaryendraco. The generic name, which is formed from combining the name Targaryen with the Latin word draco and literally means 'Targaryen dragon', refers to the fictional House Targaryen (who ride dragons and use them as heraldry) from the popular epic fantasy novel series A Song of Ice and Fire . The authors chose the name because the now black-colored bones of the fossil resemble the fictional dragons in the novels. [6]

Description

In 2019, the describing authors abstained from giving a size estimate, in view of the fragmentary nature of the fossil. They estimated the wingspan of the most closely related species at 2.9 to 4 meters (9.5 to 13.1 ft). [6]

They indicated a single distinguishing trait. It is an autapomorphy, a unique derived character. The symphysis of the lower jaws has at the midline of its front an odontoid, or tooth-like, process, formed by a confluence of the side ridges of the occlusal groove, in the top surface of the joint dentaries. [6]

Phylogeny

In 2019, Targaryendraco was placed within the Lanceodontia in an entirely new clade called Targaryendraconia, and was more precisely a member of the family Targaryendraconidae. In the latter clade it formed a polytomy with Aussiedraco and Barbosania . [6]

Below is a cladogram following Pêgas et al. (2019). In the analysis, they placed Targaryendraco in the clade Targaryendraconia as the sister taxon of Aussiedraco and Barbosania , within the more inclusive group Ornithocheirae. [6]

Ornithocheirae

Ornithocheirus

Targaryendraconia
Targaryendraconidae

Aussiedraco

Barbosania

Targaryendraco

Cimoliopteridae

Aetodactylus

Camposipterus

Cimoliopterus

Anhangueria
Hamipteridae

Hamipterus

Iberodactylus

Anhangueridae

Tropeognathus

Coloborhynchinae

Anhanguerinae

Related Research Articles

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<i>Ornithocheirus</i> Genus of ornithocheirid pterosaur from the Early Cretaceous

Ornithocheirus is a pterosaur genus known from fragmentary fossil remains uncovered from sediments in the UK and possibly Morocco.

<i>Tropeognathus</i> Genus of anhanguerid pterosaur from the Early Cretaceous

Tropeognathus is a genus of large pterosaurs from the late Early Cretaceous of South America. This genus is considered to be a member of the family Anhangueridae, however, several studies have also recovered it within another family called Ornithocheiridae. Both of these families are diverse groups of pterosaurs known for their keel-tipped snouts and large size. Tropeognathus is regarded as the largest pterosaur found in the Southern Hemisphere, only rivaled by the huge azhdarchids. The type and only species is Tropeognathus mesembrinus. Fossil remains of Tropeognathus have been recovered from the Romualdo Formation, which is a Lagerstätte located in the Santana Group of the Araripe Basin in northeastern Brazil.

<i>Coloborhynchus</i> Genus of anhanguerid pterosaur from the Cretaceous period

Coloborhynchus is a genus of pterodactyloid pterosaur belonging to the family Anhangueridae, though it has also been recovered as a member of the Ornithocheiridae in some studies. Coloborhynchus is known from the Lower Cretaceous of England, and depending on which species are included, possibly the Albian and Cenomanian ages as well. Coloborhynchus was once thought to be the largest known toothed pterosaur, however, a specimen of the closely related Tropeognathus is now thought to have had a larger wingspan.

<i>Lonchodectes</i> Genus of lonchodectid pterosaur from the Late Cretaceous

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Lonchodectidae Family of pteranodontoid pterosaurs

Lonchodectidae or Lonchodraconidae is a group of pterosaurs within the clade Pterodactyloidea. It has variously been considered to be within Ctenochasmatoidea, Azhdarchoidea and Pteranodontia. They are notable for their high, conical tooth sockets and raised alveolar margins.

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Anhangueridae Family of anhanguerian pterosaurs

Anhangueridae is a group of pterosaurs within the suborder Pterodactyloidea. They were among the last pterosaurs to possess teeth. A recent study discussing the group considered the Anhangueridae to be typified by a premaxillary crest and a lateral expansion in the distal rostrum. The same study presented a cladistic analysis, for which an "agreement subtree" was calculated. The Anhangueridae was found to be sister taxon to the large crested Tropeognathus.

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Ornithocheirae Clade of pteranodontoid pterosaurs

Ornithocheirae is an extinct clade of pteranodontoid pterosaurs from the Early Cretaceous to the Late Cretaceous of Asia, Europe, North America and South America. It was named by Harry Seeley in 1870 as a family that contains Ornithocheirus and its relatives. The name was emended to Ornithocheiridae, to match the requirements of the ICZN Code that a family-ranked clade should end with an -idae suffix. Brian Andres (2010) in his review of pterosaur phylogeny, defined the name Ornithocheirae phylogenetically, as a node-based taxon consisting of the last common ancestor of Anhanguera and Ornithocheirus and all its descendants. Thus Ornithocheirae is defined to include two families, the Anhangueridae and the Ornithocheiridae, following the opinion of Alexander Kellner and Andres that these families should not be synonymized based on their original phylogenetical definitions. However, subsequent studies in 2019 have found Ornithocheirae to be a more inclusive group containing both Anhangueria and Targaryendraconia.

<i>Cimoliopterus</i> Genus of pteranodontoid pterosaur from the Cretaceous period

Cimoliopterus is a genus of pterosaur that lived during the Late Cretaceous in what is now England and the United States. The first known specimen, consisting of the front part of a snout including part of a crest, was discovered in the Grey Chalk Subgroup of Kent, England, and described as the new species Pterodactylus cuvieri in 1851. The specific name cuvieri honours the palaeontologist George Cuvier, whereas the genus Pterodactylus was then used for many pterosaur species that are not thought to be closely related today. It was one of the first pterosaurs to be depicted as models in Crystal Palace Park in the 1850s. The species was subsequently assigned to various other genera, including Ornithocheirus and Anhanguera. In 2013, the species was moved to a new genus, as Cimoliopterus cuvieri; the generic name Cimoliopterus is derived from the Greek words for "chalk" and "wing". Other specimens and species have also been assigned to or synonymised with the species with various levels of certainty. In 2015, a snout discovered in the Britton Formation of Texas, US, was named as a new species in the genus, C. dunni; the specific name honours its collector, Brent Dunn.

<i>Lonchodraco</i> Genus of lonchodraconid pterosaur from the Cretaceous period

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Anhangueria Clade of ornithocheiran pterosaurs from the Cretaceous period

Anhangueria is a group of pterosaurs belonging to the clade Pteranodontoidea. Fossil remains of this group date back from the Early to Late Cretaceous periods, around 140 to 92.5 million years ago. Anhangueria was named by paleontologists Taissa Rodrigues and Alexander Kellner in a review of Ornithocheirus species in 2013, they defined the clade as a branch-based taxon consisting of all pteranodontoids more closely related to Anhanguera blittersdorffi than to Istiodactylus latidens and Cimoliopterus cuvieri.

<i>Ikrandraco</i> Genus of lonchodraconid pterosaur from the Early Cretaceous

Ikrandraco is a genus of lonchodraconid pterodactyloid pterosaur known from Lower Cretaceous rocks in northeastern China and the Cambridge Greensand of the UK. It is notable for its unusual skull, which features a crest on the lower jaw.

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<i>Serradraco</i> Genus of pteranodontoid pterosaur from the Early Cretaceous

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Targaryendraconia Clade of ornithocheiran pterosaurs

Targaryendraconia is an extinct clade of lanceodontian pterosaurs that lived from the Early to Late Cretaceous period in Europe, North America, South America, and Australia.

References

  1. Wild, R. 1990. "Pterosaur remains (Reptilia, Pterosauria) from the Lower Cretaceous (Hauterivian) of Hannover (Lower Saxony)". Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen, 181: 241–254
  2. 1 2 Rodrigues, T.; Kellner, A. (2013). "Taxonomic review of the Ornithocheirus complex (Pterosauria) from the Cretaceous of England". ZooKeys (308): 1–112. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.308.5559 . PMC   3689139 . PMID   23794925.
  3. 1 2 Abel, P., Hornung, J.J., Kear, B.P. & Sachs, S. 2019, "Reassessment of the enigmatic pterosaur ‘Ornithocheirus’ wiedenrothi from the Lower Cretaceous of Northern Germany", Journal of Morphology280: 73–74. doi:10.1002/jmor.21003
  4. Fletcher, T.L. & Salisbury, S.W., 2010. "New pterosaur fossils from the Early Cretaceous (Albian) of Queensland, Australia", Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 30(6): 1747–1759. DOI:10.1080/02724634.2010.521929
  5. Ford, T.L., 2013. "Will the real Lonchodectes fly in?", Short Communications/International Symposium on Pterosaurs – Rio Ptero 2013, 65–67.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 Pêgas, R.V., Holgado, B., Leal, M.E.C., 2019. "Targaryendraco wiedenrothi gen. nov. (Pterodactyloidea, Pteranodontoidea, Lanceodontia) and recognition of a new cosmopolitan lineage of Cretaceous toothed pterodactyloids", Historical Biology, 1–15. doi:10.1080/08912963.2019.1690482