Therizinosauridae
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| Therizinosaurids Fossil range: Late Cretaceous |
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Therizinosauridae ("reaper lizards") is a family of advanced herbivorous or omnivorous theropod dinosaurs. Therizinosaurid fossil remains have been recovered from mid-late Cretaceous Period deposits from Mongolia, China, and the United States.
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[edit] Classification
The family Therizinosauridae was coined by Evgeny Maleev in 1954 to contain the enigmatic Therizinosaurus cheloniformis, which Maleev originally thought to be a species of giant "turtle-like lizard."[1] Subsequent studies found that Therizinosaurus was actually a bizarre theropod, and that the equally enigmatic segnosaurids were close relatives. Since the family Therizinosauridae was named earlier than Segnosauridae, the later name became a junior synonym of the former, which has taxonomic priority. Therizinosauridae was first given a phylogenetic definition by Paul Sereno in 1998, who defined it as all dinosaurs closer to Erlikosaurus than to Ornithomimus. As the relationship of therizinosaurids to other theropods clarified and more members of the larger therizinosaur group were found, a more restrictive definition has come to be preferred for the family-level name Therizinosauridae. Sereno himself, for example, re-defined the name in 2005 as the clade containing Therizinosaurus cheloniformis, Nothronychus mckinleyi, and Neimongosaurus yangi. [2]
[edit] Taxonomy
- Family Therizinosauridae
[edit] Phylogeny
The cladogram presented here follows a 2007 phylogenetic analysis by Phil Senter.[3]
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[edit] References
- ^ Maleev, E. (1954). "New turtle-like reptile in Mongolia." Priroda, 1954: 106-108.
- ^ Sereno, P. C. 2005. Stem Archosauria—TaxonSearch [version 1.0, 2005 November 7]
- ^ Senter, P. (2007). "A new look at the phylogeny of Coelurosauria (Dinosauria: Theropoda)." Journal of Systematic Palaeontology, (doi:10.1017/S1477201907002143).
