A new Jurassic scansoriopterygid and the loss of membranous wings in theropod dinosaurs
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flight evolved independently in vertebrates in the pterosaurs, birds
and bats, each of which has a different configuration of the bony
elements and epidermal structures that form the wings1,2.
Whereas the early fossil records of pterosaurs and bats are sparse,
mounting evidence (primarily from China) of feathered non-avian
dinosaurs and stemward avians that derive primarily from the
Middle–Upper Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous periods has enabled the slow
piecing together of the origins of avian flight3,4.
These fossils demonstrate that, close to the origin of flight,
dinosaurs closely related to birds were experimenting with a diversity
of wing structures3,5. One of the most surprising of these is that of the scansoriopterygid (Theropoda, Maniraptora) Yi qi,
which has membranous wings—a flight apparatus that was previously
unknown among theropods but that is used by both the pterosaur and bat
lineages6.
This observation was not universally accepted7. Here we describe a newly identified scansoriopterygid—which we name Ambopteryx longibrachium,
gen. et sp. nov.—from the Upper Jurassic period. This specimen provides
support for the widespread existence of membranous wings and the
styliform element in the Scansoriopterygidae, as well as evidence for
the diet of this enigmatic theropod clade. Our analyses show that marked
changes in wing architecture evolved near the split between the
Scansoriopterygidae and the avian lineage, as the two clades travelled
along very different paths to becoming volant. The membranous wings
supported by elongate forelimbs that are present in scansoriopterygids
probably represent a short-lived experimentation with volant behaviour,
and feathered wings were ultimately favoured during the later evolution
of Paraves.
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Acknowledgements
We
thank S.-X. Jiang, D.-Y. Huang, Y.-H. Pan and Z.-Q. Yu for discussion,
Q.-R. Meng for help in the field, T. Zhao for taking scanning electron
microscopy photographs, D.-H. Li for specimen preparation and W. Gao for
photographing. This research was supported by the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (41688103; 41722202), Youth Innovation
Promotion Association CAS (2016073) and the State Key Laboratory of
Lithospheric Evolution (Z201604).
Reviewer information
Nature thanks Thomas Richard Holtz, Peter Makovicky and Kevin Padian for their contribution to the peer review of this work.Author information
Affiliations
Key Laboratory of Vertebrate Evolution and Human Origins of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- Min Wang
- , Jingmai K. O’Connor
- , Xing Xu
- & Zhonghe Zhou
Center for Excellence in Life and Paleoenvironment, Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing, China
- Min Wang
- , Jingmai K. O’Connor
- , Xing Xu
- & Zhonghe Zhou
Contributions
Z.Z. and M.W. designed the research project; Z.Z. and M.W. conducted the fieldwork; M.W. performed the phylogenetic, histological and phylogenetic principal component analyses; and M.W., J.K.O., X.X. and Z.Z. wrote the manuscript.Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.Corresponding author
Correspondence to Min Wang.Extended data figures and tables
Extended Data Fig. 1 Additional photographs of Ambopteryx, IVPP V24192.
a, Counter slab. b, Skeletal reconstruction based on preserved bones. c, Skull. d, Gastroliths and the unidentified bony stomach content. Abbreviations as in Fig. 1, except for: fe, feather associated with the neck; lil, left ilium;; lti, left tibia; pd, pedal digits; and ub, unidentified bony element. The white box indicates the position from which the sample was taken for histological analysis. Scale bars, 10 mm (a, c, d), 20 mm (b).Extended Data Fig. 2 Bone histology of Ambopteryx.
a–d, Thin cross-section of the left humerus (a, b) and the unidentified bony stomach content (c, d). The arrowheads indicate the osteocyte lacunae. Scale bars, 100 μm (a–c), 200 μm (d).Extended Data Fig. 3 Anatomy of Ambopteryx, IVPP V24192.
a–d, Interpretative drawings of the neck and pectoral girdle (a), caudal vertebrae and pygostyle (b), left forelimb (c) and pelvis and left hindlimb (d). Abbreviations as in Figs. 1, 2, except for: ca, caudal vertebrae; cm, calcaneum; de, deltopectoral crest of humerus; do, dorsal vertebrae; I–III, metacarpals I–III; ip, iliac peduncle of ilium; mtII–IV, metatarsals II–IV; p1–4, pedal digits I to IV; and st, styliform element. Scale bars, 10 mm (a–d).Extended Data Fig. 4 Forelimb comparisons between Ambopteryx and Yi.
a, Left forelimb of Ambopteryx (IVPP V24192). b–d, Left forelimb (b), right humerus (c) and the right styliform element (d) of Yi (STM 31-2). The proximal margins of the humeri are marked in white dashed lines to show the differences between these two taxa. Abbreviations as in Figs. 1, 2, except for: st, styliform element. Scale bars, 10 mm (a), 20 mm (b–d).Extended Data Fig. 5 Comparisons of hand morphology among Scansoriopterygidae.
a–c, Line drawings of the hands of Ambopteryx (a), Epidendrosaurus (b) and Yi (c). Scale bars, 10 mm (a, b), 20 mm (c).Extended Data Fig. 6 Scanning electron microscopy photographs of the soft tissues that are preserved in Ambopteryx.
a–d, Feather samples associated with the neck. e–f, Samples of membranous tissues taken from the area between the left femur and left manual digits. Arrows denote the positions of the samples. Scale bars, 2 μm.Extended Data Fig. 7 Time-scaled recovered strict-consensus tree of Mesozoic coelurosaurians.
Bremer and bootstrap values are labelled near the corresponding node in bold italic and upright non-bold font, respectively.Extended Data Fig. 8 Compiled super-tree of the sampled Mesozoic coelurosaurians used in morphometric analyses.
Complete tree for the coelurosaurians used in generating the PPCA morphospaces shown in Fig. 3b, c.
Supplementary information
Supplementary Information
This file contains Supplementary Text Sections 1–5; which include additional anatomical description, stomach contents and diet of Ambopteryx longibrachium, Supplementary Tables 1, 2, 4 and 5, and the data used in the phylogenetic analysis.Reporting Summary
Supplementary Table 3
This file contains appendicular limb bone measurements of Mesozoic coelurosaurians used in the phylogenetic principal components analysis.
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