Osteology of the skull of (Archosauriformes: Proterochampsidae).

is a member of the clade Proterochampsidae (non-Archosauria Archosauriformes) collected from Upper Triassic (lower Carnian) outcrops of the Chañares Formation of the Ischigualasto-Villa Unión Basin (La Rioja Province, Argentina). This species is a non-rhadinosuchine proterochampsid known from several specimens, including almost complete skeletons. Here, we describe and compare in detail the skull of based on direct observation of specimens and the three-dimensional segmentation of one of them based on computed microtomography scans.

A new herrerasaurian dinosaur from the Upper Triassic Upper Maleri Formation of south-central India.

Some of the oldest known dinosaurs and the first faunas numerically dominated by them are documented in the Upper Triassic-Lower Jurassic-aged Gondwana formations exposed in the Pranhita-Godavari Valley of south-central and east-central India. The Upper Maleri Formation of the Pranhita-Godavari Basin preserves an early-middle Norian dinosaur assemblage numerically dominated by sauropodomorph dinosaurs, including at least two nominal species. However, the preliminary report of a herrerasaurian dinosaur specimen indicates that this assemblage of south-central Gondwana was more taxonomically diverse.

Morphology of the maxilla informs about the type of predation strategy in the evolution of Abelisauridae (Dinosauria: Theropoda).

Abelisauridae is a clade of theropods distinguished by short, ornamented skulls and strongly reduced forelimbs. They represented the most abundant predatory dinosaurs in Gondwana during the Cretaceous. Bolstered by biomechanical studies, the morphology of the skull and vertebral column of abelisaurids, have led researchers to hypothesize that Late Cretaceous forms were "specialized hunters.

A revision of the pterodactyloid pterosaur Herbstosaurus pigmaeus Casamiquela, 1975 from the Late Jurassic of Argentina.

Herbstosaurus pigmaeus Casamiquela, 1975 is a Late Jurassic pterosaur from northwestern Patagonia. It is based on the natural moulds and a few bony patches of the sacrum, prepubis, ilium, and both femora of a small-sized specimen. The phylogenetic relationships of this species have been a matter of debate, having been originally interpreted as a theropod dinosaur and subsequently as a pterosaur, either as an indeterminate pterodactyloid or a probable dsungaripteroid.

Cladistic estimates of evolutionary rates focused on palaeontological datasets using TNT.

We describe a protocol for estimating evolutionary rates from phylogenetic trees based on parsimony character optimization. The rate estimation is conducted through a TNT script and the results are analysed in a script for the software environment R. The TNT script allows analysing multiple optimal topologies, considering optimization ambiguity, and alternative time-calibrations or pre-calibrated trees.

Osteology of the appendicular skeleton of Bagualia alba (Dinosauria, Eusauropoda) from the Lower Jurassic of Patagonia and the macroevolutionary history of early eusauropods.

Since their origin, sauropodomorphs have undergone numerous anatomical changes from small and bipedal early sauropodomorphs towards massive-bodied and quadrupedal sauropods. However, the timing of these changes in the evolution of the group is unclear. Here, we describe the appendicular skeleton of the early diverging eusauropod Bagualia alba from the late Early Jurassic of Patagonia, Argentina, and conduct a morphological disparity analysis based on a phylogenetic dataset of Sauropoda.

Exploring the effects of weighting against homoplasy in genealogies of palaeontological phylogenetic matrices.

Although simulations have shown that implied weighting (IW) outperforms equal weighting (EW) in phylogenetic parsimony analyses, weighting against homoplasy lacks extensive usage in palaeontology. Iterative modifications of several phylogenetic matrices in the last decades resulted in extensive genealogies of datasets that allow the evaluation of differences in the stability of results for alternative character weighting methods directly on empirical data. Each generation was compared against the most recent generation in each genealogy because it is assumed that it is the most comprehensive (higher sampling), revised (fewer misscorings) and complete (lower amount of missing data) matrix of the genealogy.

A new early-diverging probainognathian cynodont and a revision of the occurrence of cf. Aleodon from the Chañares Formation, northwestern Argentina: New clues on the faunistic composition of the latest Middle-?earliest Late Triassic Tarjadia Assemblage Zone.

The Chañares Formation (Ischigualasto-Villa Unión Basin) is worldwide known by its exquisitely preserved fossil record of latest Middle-to-early Late Triassic tetrapods, including erpetosuchids, "rauisuchians," proterochampsids, gracilisuchids, dinosauromorphs, pterosauromorphs, kannemeyeriiform dicynodonts, and traversodontid, chiniquodontid and probainognathid cynodonts, coming from the Tarjadia (bottom) and Massetognathus-Chanaresuchus (top) Assemblage Zones of its lower member. Regarding cynodonts, most of its profuse knowledge comes from the traditional layers discovered by Alfred Romer and his team in the 1960s that are now enclosed in the Massetognathus-Chanaresuchus Assemblage Zone (AZ). In this contribution we focus our study on the probainognathian cynodonts discovered in levels of the Tarjadia Assemblage Zone.

The redescription of Malerisaurus robinsonae (Archosauromorpha: Allokotosauria) from the Upper Triassic lower Maleri Formation, Pranhita-Godavari Basin, India.

Allokotosauria, a clade of non-archosauriform archosauromorphs with a broad diversity of body plans, plays a crucial role in better understanding the evolutionary history of early diverging stem-archosaurs. Here we provide a detailed redescription of Malerisaurus robinsonae, a malerisaurine allokotosaur from the middle Carnian-lowermost Norian lower Maleri Formation, Pranhita-Godavari Basin, India. The new anatomical information available from recently discovered and well-preserved skeletons of various allokotosaurs, such as Azendohsaurus madagaskarensis, Shringasaurus indicus, Puercosuchus traverorum, and Malerisaurus-like taxa, and their comparison with Malerisaurus robinsonae enriches our understanding of the anatomy of this species.

Comments on the pelvic girdle anatomy of Lagerpeton chanarensis Romer, 1971 (Archosauria) and its implications on the posture and gait of early pterosauromorphs.

Lagerpeton chanarensis is an early avemetatarsalian from the lower Carnian (lowermost Upper Triassic) levels of the Chañares Formation, La Rioja Province, Argentina. Lagerpeton and its kin were traditionally interpreted as dinosaur precursors of cursorial habits, with a bipedal posture and parasagittal gait. Some authors also speculated saltatorial capabilities for this genus.

Osteology of the sauropodomorph dinosaur Jaklapallisaurus asymmetricus from the Late Triassic of central India.

The Gondwana formations exposed in the Pranhita-Godavari Valley of central India include Middle Triassic to Lower Jurassic continental deposits that provide essential information about the tetrapod assemblages of that time, documenting some of the oldest known dinosaurs and the first faunas numerically dominated by this group. The Upper Maleri Formation of the Pranhita-Godavari Basin preserves an early-middle Norian dinosaur assemblage that provides information about the early evolutionary history of this group in central-south Gondwana. This assemblage comprises sauropodomorph dinosaurs and an herrerasaurian, including two nominal species.

A new archosauriform species from the Panchet Formation of India and the diversification of Proterosuchidae after the end-Permian mass extinction.

Proterosuchidae represents the oldest substantial diversification of Archosauromorpha and plays a key role in understanding the biotic recovery after the end-Permian mass extinction. Proterosuchidae was long treated as a wastebasket taxon, but recent revisions have reduced its taxonomic content to five valid species from the latest Permian of Russia and the earliest Triassic (Induan) of South Africa and China. In addition to these occurrences, several isolated proterosuchid bones have been reported from the Induan Panchet Formation of India for over 150 years.

The better to eat you with: morphological disparity and enamel ultrastructure in odontocetes.

Variations in the shape and size of teeth have been associated with changes in enamel ultrastructure across odontocetes. Characterizing these features in extinct taxa can elucidate their functional morphology and feeding strategy, while also shedding light into macroevolutionary patterns during the evolutionary history of cetaceans. This study aimed to (1) describe the enamel and dentine ultrastructure of the Early Miocene odontocetes Notocetus vanbenedeni and Phoberodon arctirostris from Patagonia (Argentina) and (2) quantify tooth and enamel ultrastructure morphological disparity among odontocetes.

New rhadinosuchine proterochampsids from the late Middle-early Late Triassic of southern Brazil enhance the diversity of archosauriforms.

Proterochampsidae is a clade of non-archosaurian archosauriforms restricted to the Middle to the Late Triassic of the Ischigualasto-Villa Unión Basin of Argentina and the Santa Maria Supersequence of Brazil. A reappraisal of proterochampsid specimens from the Brazilian Dinodontosaurus Assemblage Zone (AZ) of the Pinheiros-Chiniquá Sequence (late Ladinian-early Carnian) is presented here. One of the specimens was preliminary assigned to Chanaresuchus sp.

New reptile shows dinosaurs and pterosaurs evolved among diverse precursors.

Dinosaurs and pterosaurs have remarkable diversity and disparity through most of the Mesozoic Era. Soon after their origins, these reptiles diversified into a number of long-lived lineages, evolved unprecedented ecologies (for example, flying, large herbivorous forms) and spread across Pangaea. Recent discoveries of dinosaur and pterosaur precursors demonstrated that these animals were also speciose and widespread, but those precursors have few if any well-preserved skulls, hands and associated skeletons.

On the homology of crocodylian post-dentary bones and their macroevolution throughout Pseudosuchia.

The lower jaw of early tetrapods is composed of several intramembranous ossifications. However, a tendency toward the independent reduction of the number of bones has been observed in the mandible of mammals, lepidosaurs, turtles, crocodiles, and birds. Regarding archosaurs, the coronoid and prearticular bones are interpreted to be lost during the evolution of stem-birds and stem-crocodiles, respectively, but the homology of the post-dentary bones retained in living pseudosuchians remains unclear.

Sauropodomorph evolution across the Triassic-Jurassic boundary: body size, locomotion, and their influence on morphological disparity.

Sauropodomorph dinosaurs were the dominant medium to large-sized herbivores of most Mesozoic continental ecosystems, being characterized by their long necks and reaching a size unparalleled by other terrestrial animals (> 60 tonnes). Our study of morphological disparity across the entire skeleton shows that during the Late Triassic the oldest known sauropodomorphs occupied a small region of morphospace, subsequently diversifying both taxonomically and ecologically, and shifting to a different and broader region of the morphospace. After the Triassic-Jurassic boundary event, there are no substancial changes in sauropodomorph morphospace occupation.

, a new small-sized coelophysoid theropod from the Late Triassic of Wales.

We describe a new small-bodied coelophysoid theropod dinosaur, gen. et sp. nov, from the Late Triassic fissure fill deposits of Pant-y-ffynnon in southern Wales.

Skull osteology of the holotype of the rhynchosaur Hyperodapedon sanjuanensis (Sill, 1970) from the Upper Triassic Ischigualasto Formation of Argentina.

Rhynchosaurs are bulky quadrupedal herbivores that achieved a cosmopolitan distribution during the Middle and Late Triassic. Rhynchosaurids are characterized by a pair of premaxillae modified into an edentulous beak that had a bone-to-bone occlusion with the tips of the dentaries, and a specialized masticatory apparatus composed of groove(s) on the maxilla and ridges(s) on the dentary. The Argentinian fossil record of rhynchosaurs is abundant, but only two nominal species have been named so far.

New specimens provide insights into the anatomy of the dinosauriform Lewisuchus admixtus Romer, 1972 from the upper Triassic levels of the Chañares Formation, NW Argentina.

Lewisuchus admixtus is an early dinosauriform described by Alfred Romer in 1972 on the basis of a single, incomplete skeleton, collected in lower Upper Triassic rocks of the renowned Chañares Formation, at the Los Chañares type-locality, La Rioja Province, north-western Argentina. Recent field explorations to the type-locality resulted in the discovery of two partial articulated skeletons, which provide significant novel information. The cranial bones, presacral series, femur, tibia, and proximal tarsals of the new specimens match the preserved overlapping anatomy of the holotype and previously referred specimens of L.

Deep evolutionary diversification of semicircular canals in archosaurs.

Living archosaurs (birds and crocodylians) have disparate locomotor strategies that evolved since their divergence ∼250 mya. Little is known about the early evolution of the sensory structures that are coupled with these changes, mostly due to limited sampling of early fossils on key stem lineages. In particular, the morphology of the semicircular canals (SCCs) of the endosseous labyrinth has a long-hypothesized relationship with locomotion.

The postcranial skeleton of the erythrosuchid archosauriform from the Early Triassic of European Russia.

Erythrosuchidae were large-bodied, quadrupedal, predatory archosauriforms that dominated the hypercarnivorous niche in the aftermath of the Permo-Triassic mass extinction. , one of the oldest members of the clade, is known from the late Olenekian of European Russia. The holotype of comprises a well-preserved skull, but highly incomplete postcranium.

Enigmatic dinosaur precursors bridge the gap to the origin of Pterosauria.

Pterosaurs were the first vertebrates to evolve powered flight and comprised one of the main evolutionary radiations in terrestrial ecosystems of the Mesozoic era (approximately 252-66 million years ago), but their origin has remained an unresolved enigma in palaeontology since the nineteenth century. These flying reptiles have been hypothesized to be the close relatives of a wide variety of reptilian clades, including dinosaur relatives, and there is still a major morphological gap between those forms and the oldest, unambiguous pterosaurs from the Upper Triassic series. Here, using recent discoveries of well-preserved cranial remains, microcomputed tomography scans of fragile skull bones (jaws, skull roofs and braincases) and reliably associated postcrania, we demonstrate that lagerpetids-a group of cursorial, non-volant dinosaur precursors-are the sister group of pterosaurs, sharing numerous synapomorphies across the entire skeleton.