中国科学院古脊椎动物与古人类研究所王敏团队在研究中取得进展。他们的最新研究提出了中国晚侏罗世最早的短尾鸟。2025年2月12日出版的《自然》杂志发表了这项成果。

本文报道了我国最古老的短尾鸟——“政和八闽鸟”，它来自最近发现的侏罗纪晚期政和动物群，填补了最早分支鸟类化石记录中一个明显的时空空白。“政和八闽鸟”表现出独特的衍生鸟胸状胸腹带和非鸟形手盗龙手的组合，证明了沿着鸟形茎线的马赛克进化。根据形态测量和系统发育分析，从同一地点采集的鸟类叉骨可能涉及今鸟型类。

这些新发现的化石证明了高度衍生的鸟类特征的早期出现，并与同一地点的鸟氨酸化石一起，表明鸟类的起源更早，早期鸟类的辐射在侏罗纪。

研究人员表示，最近的宏观进化研究预测了侏罗纪时期早期鸟类的多样化，但毫无疑问的侏罗纪鸟类化石记录仅限于始祖鸟，一些分析也将其称为恐爪龙恐龙。虽然它们有羽毛翅膀，但已知的侏罗纪鸟类更类似于非鸟类兽脚亚目，因为它们有祖先的长长的爬行动物尾巴。这与大多数白垩纪动物和冠向分类群形成鲜明对比，后者有一条短尾巴，尾巴末端是一根叫做尾柱的复合骨。

附：英文原文

Title: Earliest short-tailed bird from the Late Jurassic of China

Author: Chen, Runsheng, Wang, Min, Dong, Liping, Zhou, Guowu, Xu, Xing, Deng, Ke, Xu, Liming, Zhang, Chi, Wang, Linchang, Du, Honggang, Lin, Ganmin, Lin, Min, Zhou, Zhonghe

Issue&Volume: 2025-02-12

Abstract: Recent macroevolutionary studies predict a diversification of early birds during the Jurassic period1,2,3,4, but the unquestionable Jurassic bird fossil record is limited to Archaeopteryx1,5,6, which has also been referred to deinonychosaurian dinosaurs by some analyses7,8. Although they have feathered wings, the known Jurassic birds are more similar to non-avialan theropods in having the ancestral long reptilian tail9,10,11. This is in stark contrast to most Cretaceous and crownward taxa, which have a short tail that terminates in a compound bone called the pygostyle12,13,14. Here we report on the oldest short-tailed avialan, Baminornis zhenghensis gen. et sp. nov., from the recently discovered Late Jurassic Zhenghe Fauna15, which fills a noticeable spatio-temporal gap in the earliest branching avialan fossil record. B. zhenghensis exhibits a unique combination of derived ornithothoracine-like pectoral and pelvic girdles and plesiomorphic non-avialan maniraptoran hand, demonstrating mosaic evolution along stem avialan line. An avialan furcula collected from the same locality is referrable to ornithuromorphs on the basis of our morphometric and phylogenetic analyses. These newly discovered fossils demonstrate the early appearance of highly derived bird features, and together with an anchiornithine fossil from the same locality, they suggest an earlier origin of birds and a radiation of early birds in the Jurassic.

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-08410-z

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08410-z