Home - News ( United States | United Kingdom | Italy | Germany ) - Football scores

Showing content from https://link.springer.com/doi/10.1007/s00114-003-0416-5 below:

Jeholornis compared to Archaeopteryx, with a new understanding of the earliest avian evolution

The recently reported Jeholornis represents the only known bird with a complete long skeletal tail except for Archaeopteryx. Two newly discovered specimens referable to Jeholornis provide some important new information about its anatomy. The tail of Jeholornis is much longer than that of Archaeopteryx and comprises a maximum of 27 caudal vertebrae compared with only 23 in Archaeopteryx. More interestingly, the tail feathers are shaped more like those of dromaeosaurs than those of Archaeopteryx. We conclude that the common ancestor of birds must have a more primitive tail than that in Archaeopteryx, confirming the side branch position of Archaeopteryx in the early avian evolution. The synsacrum is composed of six sacrals, representing a transitional stage between Archaeopteryx and more advanced birds. The scapula of Jeholornis has a dorso-laterally exposed glenoid facet, and the coracoid has a supracoracoid foramen. The presence of a pair of fenestrae in the sternum of Jeholornis has further implications for the air-sac system in early birds.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Springer+ Basic

€34.99 /Month

• Get 10 units per month
• Download Article/Chapter or eBook
• 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
• Cancel anytime

Price includes VAT (Germany)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

• Britt BB, Makovicky PJ, Gauthier J, Bonde N (1998) Postcranial pneumatization in Archaeopteryx. Nature 395:374–376

  Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

• Chiappe LM, Ji S, Ji Q, Norell MA (1999) Anatomy and systematics of the Confuciusornithidae (Aves) from the Mesozoic of Northeastern China. Am Mus Novit 242:1–89

  Google Scholar 

• Christiansen P, Bonde N (2000) Axial and appendicular pneumaticity in Archaeopteryx. Proc R Soc Lond B 267:2501–2505

  Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

• Elzanowski A (2001) A new genus and species or the largest specimen of Archaeopteryx. Acta Palaeontol Pol 41(4):519–532

  Google Scholar 

• Feduccia A (1999) The origin and evolution of birds. Yale University Press, New Haven, Conn.

• Forster CA, Sampson SD, Chiappe LM Krause DW (1998) The theropod ancestry of birds: new evidence from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar. Science 279:1915–1919

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Hou L, Martin LD, Zhou Z, Feduccia A (1996) Early adaptive radiation of birds: evidence from fossils from northeastern China. Science 274:1164–1167

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Jenkins FA, Dial KP Jr, Goslow GE Jr (1988) A cineradiographic analysis of bird flight: the wishbone in starlings is a spring. Science 241:1495–1498

  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Ji Q, Currie PJ, Norell MA, Ji S (1998) Two feathered dinosaurs from northeastern China. Nature 393:753–761

  Article  Google Scholar 

• Martin LD (1983) The origin and early radiation of birds. In: Bush AH, Clark GA Jr (eds) Perspectives in ornithology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 291–338

• Martin LD (1991) Mesozoic birds and the origin of birds. In: Schultze HP, Trueb L (eds) Origin of the higher groups of tetrapods. Comstock, Ithaca, N.Y., pp 485–540

• Martin LD, Zhou Z, Hou L, Feduccia A (1998) Confuciusornis sanctus compared to Archaeopteryx lithographica. Naturwissenschaften 85:286–289

  Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

• Norell MA, Makovicky P (1999) Important features of the dromaeosaurid skeleton: information II: information from a newly collected specimen of Velociraptor mongoliensis. Am Mus Novit 3282:1–45

  Google Scholar 

• Norell M, Ji Q, Gao K, Yuan C, Zhao Y, Wang L (2002) ‘Modern’ feathers on a non-avian dinosaur. Nature 416:36–37

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Sanz JL, Chiappe LM, Buscalioni AD (1995) The osteology of Concornis lacustris (Aves: Enantiornithes) from the Lower Cretaceous of Spain and a re-examination of its phylogenetic relationships. Am Mus Novit 3133:1–23

  Google Scholar 

• Wang X, Zhou Z (2002) A pterodactyloid pterosaur from the Jiufotang Formation of Liaoning, China. Chinese Sci Bull 47(20):1521–1527

  Google Scholar 

• Wellnhofer PA (1992) A new specimen of Archaeopteryx from the Solnhofen Limestone. Nat Hist Mus Los Angeles C Sci Ser 36:3–23

  Google Scholar 

• Welty JC (1982) The life of birds. Saunders College Publishing, Philadelphia, Pa

• Xu X, Zhou Z, Wang X (2000) The smallest known non-avian theropod dinosaur. Nature 408:705–708

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Xu X, Zhou Z, Wang X, Kuang X, Zhang F, Du X (2003) Four-winged dinosaurs from China. Nature 421: 335–340

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Zhang F, Zhou Z (2000) A primitive enantiornithine bird and the origin of feathers. Science 290:1955–1959

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Zhang Z, Zhou Z, Hou L, Gu G (2001) Early diversification of birds-evidence from a new opposite bird. Chin Sci Bull 46(11):945–949

  Article  Google Scholar 

• Zhou Z (1995) Discovery of Early Cretaceous birds in China. Cour Forchungsinst Senckenb 181:9–23

  Google Scholar 

• Zhou Z, Farlow JO (2001) Flight capability and habits of Confuciusornis. In: Gauthier J, Gall LF (eds) New perspectives on the origin and early evolution of birds. Special publication of the Peabody Museum of Natural History, Yale University, pp 237–254

• Zhou Z, Zhang Z (2001) Two new ornithurine birds from the Early Cretaceous of western Liaoning, China. Chin Sci Bull 46(15):1258–1264

  Article  Google Scholar 

• Zhou Z, Zhang F (2002a) A long-tailed, seed-eating bird from the Early Cretaceous of China. Nature 418:405–409

  Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

• Zhou Z, Zhang F (2002b) Largest bird from the Early Cretaceous and its implications for the earliest avian ecological diversification. Naturwissenschaften 89:34–38

  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

We thank L.D. Martin, P. Currie and L. M. Chiappe for discussions, and X. Wang for help in the field. Y. Li prepared the specimens. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, Special Funds for Major State Basic Research Projects of China (G2000077700) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

1. Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, PO Box 643, 100044, Beijing, China

   Zhonghe Zhou & Fucheng Zhang

1. Zhonghe Zhou
2. Fucheng Zhang

Correspondence to Zhonghe Zhou.

Zhou, Z., Zhang, F. Jeholornis compared to Archaeopteryx, with a new understanding of the earliest avian evolution. Naturwissenschaften 90, 220–225 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-003-0416-5

Download citation

• Received: 17 September 2002

• Accepted: 17 March 2003

• Published: 15 April 2003

• Issue Date: May 2003

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-003-0416-5

RetroSearch is an open source project built by @garambo | Open a GitHub Issue

Search and Browse the WWW like it's 1997 | Search results from DuckDuckGo

HTML: 3.2 | Encoding: UTF-8 | Version: 0.7.4