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A new pterosaur (Pterodactyloidea: Azhdarchidae) from the Upper Cretaceous of Morocco.

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posted on 2012-10-24, 09:09 authored by N. Ibrahim, David M. Unwin, D. M. Martill, L. Baidder, S. Zouhri
The Kem Kem beds in South Eastern Morocco contain a rich early Upper (or possibly late Lower) Cretaceous vertebrate assemblage. Fragmentary remains, predominantly teeth and jaw tips, represent several kinds of pterosaur although only one species, the ornithocheirid Coloborhynchus moroccensis, has been named. Here, we describe a new azhdarchid pterosaur, Alanqa saharica nov. gen. nov. sp., based on an almost complete well preserved mandibular symphysis from Aferdou N'Chaft. We assign additional fragmentary jaw remains, some of which have been tentatively identified as azhdarchid and pteranodontid, to this new taxon which is distinguished from other azhdarchids by a remarkably straight, elongate, lance-shaped mandibular symphysis that bears a pronounced dorsal eminence near the posterior end of its dorsal (occlusal) surface. Most remains, including the holotype, represent individuals of approximately three to four meters in wingspan, but a fragment of a large cervical vertebra, that probably also belongs to A. saharica, suggests that wingspans of six meters were achieved in this species. The Kem Kem beds have yielded the most diverse pterosaur assemblage yet reported from Africa and provide the first clear evidence for the presence of azhdarchids in Gondwana at the start of the Late Cretaceous. This, the relatively large size achieved by Alanqa, and the additional evidence of variable jaw morphology in azhdarchids provided by this taxon, indicates a longer and more complex history for this clade than previously suspected.

Funding

Funding: This research was supported by an Ad Astra Research Scholarship awarded to NI (http://www.ucd.ie/), financial support from the University of Portsmouth to DMM (http://www.port.ac.uk/), contributions from members of the December 2008 expedition to Morocco [Robert Loveridge, Richard Hing, Darren Naish] and a New Blood grant awarded to DMU by Leicester University (http://www.le.ac.uk/ms/contactus/davidun​win.html).

History

Citation

PLoS ONE, 2010, 5 (5), pp. e10875-e10875

Published in

PLoS ONE

Publisher

Public Library of Science

issn

1932-6203

eissn

1932-6203

Copyright date

2010

Available date

2012-10-24

Publisher version

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0010875

Language

eng

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