Hulsanpes
| Hulsanpes Temporal range: Late Cretaceous, 70 Ma | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Order: | Saurischia |
| Suborder: | Theropoda |
| Clade: | Euornithes |
| Genus: | †Hulsanpes Osmólska, 1982 |
| Species: | † H. perlei |
| Binomial name | |
| Hulsanpes perlei Osmólska, 1982 | |
Hulsanpes is the name given to a monotypic genus of eumaniraptoran theropod dinosaurs from the Late Cretaceous of Mongolia.
The fossil remains of Hulsanpes were found in 1970 by a Polish-Mongolian expedition to the Gobi Desert at Khulsan, Ömnögovi Province.[1]
The type species, Hulsanpes perlei, was named and described by Halszka Osmólska in 1982. The generic name means "foot from Khulsan", from the Latinized name of the type locality (Hulsan) + Latin pēs, "foot". The specific name honors the Mongolian paleontologist Altangerel Perle.[1]
Hulsanpes is based on holotype ZPAL MgD-I/173, uncovered in a layer of the Barun Goyot Formation, dating from the late Campanian (roughly 73 mya). It consist of a partial right foot skeleton of an apparently immature individual. It contains the second, third and fourth metatarsal and the first and partial second phalanx of the second toe. The longest bone, the third metatarsal, has a length of thirty-nine millimetres.[1]
Osmólska in 1982 placed Hulsanpes in the Dromaeosauridae.[1] Later it was sometimes considered a "primitive" bird. Several features of the fossil were according to Osmólska too "primitive" for it to be a bird, such as the lack of fusion of the metatarsals but this might partly be due to the young age of the individual. Still, more material is needed before H. perlei can be assigned to any one lineage with certainty. Although it has been considered an enantiornithine or other primitive avian, it looks somewhat like a miniature Velociraptor mongoliensis.[2] And though these traits are plesiomorphic, it might still belong to another, non-avian, maniraptoran lineage altogether,[3] perhaps being troodontid, perhaps dromaeosaurid. It has also been considered to be a velociraptorine dromaeosaur. Pending a comparison with other more recently discovered taxa, all that can presently be said is that it is some sort of maniraptoran.
Footnotes
References
- Currie, Philip J. (2000): Theropods from the Cretaceous of Mongolia. In: Benton, M. J.; Shishkin, M. A.; Unwin, D. M. & Kurochkin, E. N. (eds.): The Age of Dinosaurs in Russia and Mongolia: 434-455. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. ISBN 0-521-54582-X PDF fulltext