A new choristodere (Reptilia: Diapsida) from the Lower Cretaceous of western Liaoning Province, China, and phylogenetic relationships of Monjurosuchidae

Authors: GAO, KE-QIN; FOX, RICHARD C.

Source: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, Volume 145, Number 3, November 2005 , pp. 427-444(18)

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Abstract:

The publication of the scientific name Monjurosuchus splendens in 1940 documented the first tetrapod fossil of the later world-renowned Jehol Biota. For more than half a century since this discovery, however, Monjurosuchus has remained as a monotypic genus of the family Monjurosuchidae, and the relationships of the family with choristoderes have not been correctly recognized until quite recently. In this paper, a new monjurosuchid is named and described based on a nearly complete skull and postcranial skeleton from the Early Cretaceous Chiufotang Formation exposed near Chaoyang, western Liaoning Province, China. This new material documents the first occurrence of monjurosuchid choristoderes outside the type Lingyuan area, and extends the geological range of the family from the Yixian Formation to the younger Chiufotang Formation. Cladistic analyses were conducted with inclusion of monjurosuchids, and the results support the placement of the family Monjurosuchidae as a primitive clade outside the Neochoristodera. A new classification scheme is proposed for choristoderes on the basis of the recovered phylogenetic framework of the group. © 2005 The Linnean Society of London, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2005, 145, 427–444.

Keywords: Chiufotang Formation; Choristodera; choristoderan phylogeny; Early Cretaceous; Jehol Biota; osteology

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1096-3642.2005.00191.x

Affiliations: 1: Laboratory for Vertebrate Palaeontology, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, Edmonton T6G 2E9, Canada

Publication date: 2005-11-01