Teviornis

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Teviornis
Temporal range: Late Cretaceous, 70  Ma
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Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Family: Presbyornithidae
Genus: Teviornis
Kurochkin, Dyke & Karhu, 2002
Species:
T. gobiensis
Binomial name
Teviornis gobiensis
Kurochkin, Dyke & Karhu, 2002

Teviornis is an extinct genus of presbyornithid which lived during the Maastrichtian stage, around 70 million years ago. One species has been described, T. gobiensis. It is the oldest known neognath and its fossils are collected from the Nemegt Formation of Mongolia. [1]

Contents

Discovery and naming

The fossils were collected at the Gurilyn tsav locality, northwest corner of Umnogobi Aimak, Mongolia. The holotype consists of a crushed partial right forelimb. These pieces include a nearly complete right carpometacarpus, two phalanges, the radiale and ulnare of the wrist, and a fragment of the distal right humerus. The catalog number of these fossils are given multiple times as PIN 4499–1, but they are listed as PIN 44991–1 on page 3, where the holotype is formally listed. This is probably a misprint. [2]

The genus name Teviornis is the Greek masculine word for bird combined with the name of Victor Tereschenko, the Paleontologist at the PIN who discovered the specimen. The species name T. gobiensis refers to the harsh Gobi Desert in which the fossil was found. The fossils are in the collection of the Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow. [2]

Classification

In 2002, Teviornis was described by Kurochkin, Dyke & Karhu as a member of the Presbyornithidae. These were stilt-legged, Anseriform, waterfowl which are extinct, but which flourished during the Late Cretaceous and Paleogene. If Teviornis does belong to the Presbyornithidae then, together with Vegavis from Antarctica, there is evidence that relatives of today's waterfowl already were widespread and highly apomorphic by the end of the Mesozoic. [2]

Clarke and Norell reviewed the specimen in 2004. They concluded that some of the characters used by Kurochkin et al. to assign T. gobiensis to the Anseriformes, such as an unbowed metacarpal III, are plesiomorphies which are primitive for Avialae and also retained in some members of Ornithurae. They found that the remaining characters used by Kurochkin et al. also had wider distribution than was assumed, or had an incompletely studied distribution. Moreover, Clarke and Norell found no synapomorphies of Aves (sensu Gauthier), Neognathae, or Galloanseres, preserved in PIN 4499–1, so they concluded that Teviornis cannot be confidently assigned to the Presbyornithidae. [3]

In 2016, De Pietri and colleagues reassessed the type specimen of Teviornis and confirmed the taxon's identity as a presbyornithid on the basis of the trochlea carpalis extension, elongate sulcus tendineus, metacarpal synostosis, etc. Certain morphological traits of the type specimen including the facies articularis dimension and the craniocaudally elongated fossa are also found in the other presbyornithids such as Wilaru and Telmabates . Its non-curved carpometacarpus also confirms its identity as an anseriform outside the crown-group. [4] A 2019 study also supports the placement of presbyornithids as stem anseriforms. [5] In 2020, a possible Eocene presbyornithid specimen from Algeria notably showed similarity to Teviornis based on the carpal trochlea extension and the shape of the fossa, reaffirming the taxonomic identity of this taxon as a presbyornithid. [6]

Related Research Articles

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Tarbosaurus is a genus of tyrannosaurine theropod dinosaur that lived in Asia about 70 million years ago, during the Maastrichtian age at the end of the Late Cretaceous period, considered to contain a single known species: Tarbosaurus bataar. Fossils have been recovered from the Nemegt and Djadochta Formations of Mongolia, with more fragmentary remains found further afield in China.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anseriformes</span> Order of water birds

Anseriformes is an order of birds also known as waterfowl that comprises about 180 living species of birds in three families: Anhimidae, Anseranatidae, and Anatidae, the largest family, which includes over 170 species of waterfowl, among them the ducks, geese, and swans. Most modern species in the order are highly adapted for an aquatic existence at the water surface. With the exception of screamers, males have penises, a trait that has been lost in the Neoaves. Due to their aquatic nature, most species are web-footed.

<i>Vegavis</i> Extinct genus of birds

Vegavis is a genus of extinct bird that lived in Antarctica during the Maastrichtian stage of the Late Cretaceous, around 66.5 million years ago. The type species is Vegavis iaai. Vegavis was considered to be a member of Anseriformes within Galloanserae, but this claim has not been supported by recent studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neognathae</span> Infraclass of birds

Neognathae is an infraclass of birds, called neognaths, within the class Aves of the clade Archosauria. Neognathae includes the majority of living birds; the exceptions being the tinamous and the flightless ratites, which belong instead to the sister taxon Palaeognathae. There are nearly 10,000 living species of neognaths.

<i>Gobipteryx</i> Extinct genus of birds

Gobipteryx is a genus of prehistoric bird from the Campanian Age of the Late Cretaceous Period. It is not known to have any direct descendants. Like the rest of the enantiornithes clade, Gobipteryx is thought to have gone extinct near the end of the Cretaceous.

<i>Presbyornis</i> Extinct genus of birds

Presbyornis is an extinct genus of presbyornithid bird from North America during the Paleogene period, between the Late Paleocene and Early Eocene.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barun Goyot Formation</span>

The Barun Goyot Formation is a geological formation dating to the Late Cretaceous Period. It is located within and is widely represented in the Gobi Desert Basin, in the Ömnögovi Province of Mongolia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nemegt Formation</span> Geological formation in Mongolia

The Nemegt Formation is a geological formation in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia, dating to the Late Cretaceous. The formation consists of river channel sediments and contains fossils of fish, turtles, crocodilians, and a diverse fauna of dinosaurs, including birds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Djadochta Formation</span> Geologic formation in Mongolia

The Djadochta Formation is a highly fossiliferous geological formation situated in Central Asia, Gobi Desert, dating from the Late Cretaceous period, about 75 million to 71 million years ago. The type locality is the Bayn Dzak locality, famously known as the Flaming Cliffs. Reptile and mammal remains are among the fossils recovered from the formation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Presbyornithidae</span> Extinct family of birds

Presbyornithidae is an extinct group of birds found in North America, South America, East Asia, Australia and possibly North Africa. They had evolved by the Maastrichtian age of the Late Cretaceous and became extinct during the Aquitanian age of the Early Miocene. The family contains the oldest known neognath, Teviornis from the Nemegt Formation of Mongolia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pelagornithidae</span> Extinct family of seabirds

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Gurilynia is a genus of enantiornithine birds. One species is known, G. nessovi. It lived during the Maastrichtian stage of the Late Cretaceous period, between 70 and 66 mya. Gurilynia is known from fragmentary fossils found at the Gurilyn Tsav locality of the Nemegt Formation in south Gobi, Mongolia.

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Minotaurasaurus is a monospecific genus of ankylosaurid dinosaur that lived in Mongolia during the Late Cretaceous in what is now the Djadochta Formation. The type and only species, Minotaurasaurus ramachandrani, is known from two skulls, a cervical vertebra and a cervical half ring. It was named and described in 2009 by Clifford Miles and Clark Miles. The first fossils of Minotaurasaurus were illegally exported out of Mongolia.It has been suggested to be a synonym of Tarchia but more recent publications consider it as a distinct genus.

Wilaru is an extinct genus of presbyornithid from Australia during the Late Oligocene to Early Miocene, around 24-22 million years ago. It was originally classified as a stone-curlew, but subsequently it was argued to be the youngest member of the extinct family Presbyornithidae instead, and the discovery of a similar Eocene presbyornithid Murgonornis archeri also supports this taxonomic assignment. The type species is Wilaru tedfordi, and the second species is Wilaru prideauxi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Odontoanserae</span> Clade of birds

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References

  1. Marjanović, D. (2021). "The Making of Calibration Sausage Exemplified by Recalibrating the Transcriptomic Timetree of Jawed Vertebrates". Frontiers in Genetics. 12. 521693. doi: 10.3389/fgene.2021.521693 . PMC   8149952 . PMID   34054911.
  2. 1 2 3 Kurochkin, E. N.; Dyke, G. J.; Karhu, A. A. (2002). "A new presbyornithid bird (Aves, Anseriformes) from the late Cretaceous of southern Mongolia". American Museum Novitates (3386): 1–11. doi:10.1206/0003-0082(2002)386<0001:ANPBAA>2.0.CO;2. hdl: 2246/2875 . S2CID   59147935.
  3. Clarke, Julia A., Norell, Mark A. (2004) "New Avialan Remains and a Review of the Late Cretaceous Nemegt Formation of Mongolia" "American Museum Novitates" Number 3447, 12pp. June 2, 2004
  4. De Pietri, V.L.; Scofield, R.P.; Zelenkov, N.; Boles, W.E.; Worthy, T.H. (2016). "The unexpected survival of an ancient lineage of anseriform birds into the Neogene of Australia: the youngest record of Presbyornithidae". Royal Society Open Science. 3 (2): 150635. Bibcode:2016RSOS....350635D. doi:10.1098/rsos.150635. PMC   4785986 . PMID   26998335.
  5. Claudia P. Tambussi; Federico J. Degrange; Ricardo S. De Mendoza; Emilia Sferco; Sergrio Santillana (2019). "A stem anseriform from the early Palaeocene of Antarctica provides new key evidence in the early evolution of waterfowl". Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. 186 (3): 673–700. doi:10.1093/zoolinnean/zly085.
  6. Géraldine Garcia; Cécile Mourer-Chauviré; Mohammed Adaci; Mustapha Bensalah; Fateh Mebrouk; Xavier Valentin; M'hammed Mahboubi; Rodolphe Tabuce (2020). "First discovery of avian egg and bone remains (Presbyornithidae) from the Gour Lazib (Eocene, Algeria)" (PDF). Journal of African Earth Sciences. 162: Article 103666. Bibcode:2020JAfES.16203666G. doi:10.1016/j.jafrearsci.2019.103666. S2CID   210607715.