Microraptor
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| Microraptor zhaoianus Conservation status: Fossil | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Microraptor zhaoianus Xu, Zhou & Wang, 2000 |
Microraptor zhaoianus ("Zhao Xijin's small thief') is a small, feathered dromaeosaurid dinosaur species from the Lower Cretaceous (Middle Barremian-Lower Aptian). Like Archaeopteryx, it demonstrates the close evolutionary relationship between birds and dinosaurs, as it had long feathers on its limbs and tail. Two species have been named, M. zhaoianus and M. gui. It has recently been suggested that all of the specimens belong to a single species, which is properly called M. zhaoianus.
Description
Microraptor was about 77cm long from its nose to the tip of its tail. Like its close relative Cryptovolans (possibly a junior synonym of Microraptor), Microraptor had long feathers on both its fore- and hind legs, which has led to it being called a "four-winged dinosaur".
It has been proposed by Chinese scientists that the animal glided, rather than flew properly. However, close studies of the Berlin specimen of the primitive bird Archaeopteryx show that it too, had flight feathers on its hind legs, albeit shortened. Many scientists now think that all basal avians had feathers on their hind legs, and that they were used like the tail feathers of present birds for maintaining balance and changing direction in the air.
Six virtually complete skeletons were found in Liaoning, China in 2001 and 2002.
Naming
- Main article: Archaeoraptor
The naming of Microraptor is controversial because of the unusual circumstances of its first description. The first specimen to be described was part of a chimeric specimen — a fraud assembled from multiple specimens in China and smuggled to the USA for sale. After the fraud was revealed by Xu Xing of Beijing's Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Storrs L. Olson, curator of birds in the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution, published a description of the tail in an obscure journal, giving it the name Archaeoraptor liaoningensis in an attempt to remove the name from the paleornithological record by assigning it to the part least likely to be a bird.[1] However, Xu had discovered the remainder of the specimen from which the tail had been taken, and published a description of it later that year, giving it the name Microraptor zhaoianus.[2]
Since the two names designate the same individual as the type specimen, Microraptor zhaoianus is a junior objective synonym of Archaeoraptor liaoningensis, and the latter — if valid — has priority. So according to some interpretations of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature the valid name for this dinosaur probably is Archaeoraptor liaoningensis Olson 2000. However, there is some doubt whether Olson in fact succeeded in meeting all the formal requirements for establishing a new taxon.
Most paleontologists are unwilling to use the name Archaeoraptor regardless of the precise legal status of the name; first, because that name is strongly associated with the fraud and the National Geographic scandal; and second, because they view Olson's use of the name as attempted nomenclatural sabotage and do not want to support it. So the name Microraptor zhaoianus Xu et al., 2000 has almost universal currency.
References
- ^ Storrs L. Olson, 2000. Countdown to Piltdown at National Geographic: the rise and fall of Archaeoraptor. Backbone 13(2) (April): 1–3.
- ^ Xu Xing, Zhonghe Zhou and Xiaolin Wang, 2000. The smallest known non-avian theropod dinosaur. Nature 408 (December): 705-708.
