Pterosaur integumentary structures with complex feather-like branching

Yang, Zixiao; Jiang, Baoyu; McNamara, Maria E.; Kearns, Stuart L.; Pittman, Michael; Kaye, Thomas G.; Orr, Patrick J.; Xu, Xing; Benton, Michael J.

doi:10.1038/s41559-018-0728-7

Cited by 80 publications

(117 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…Insulation would have been increasingly important throughout the protracted period of body size reduction along the evolutionary lineage toward extant birds (51,52). Therefore, the acquisition of dense plumage among Mesozoic dinosaurs, which may have arisen independently in theropods (53) and ornithischians (54) or deeper still along the lineage subtending pterosaurs and dinosaurs (55), may have been related to selection for body heat retention in smallerbodied animals before being co-opted for sexual display or flying potential.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eggshell geochemistry reveals ancestral metabolic thermoregulation in Dinosauria

et al. 2020

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Studying the origin of avian thermoregulation is complicated by a lack of reliable methods for measuring body temperatures in extinct dinosaurs. Evidence from bone histology and stableisotopes often relies on uncertain assumptions about the relationship between growth rate and body temperature, or the isotopic composition (δ18O) of body water. Clumped isotope (Δ47) paleothermometry, based on binding of 13C to 18O, provides a more robust tool, but has yet to be applied across a broad phylogenetic range of dinosaurs while accounting for paleoenvironmental conditions. Applying this method to well-preserved fossil eggshells demonstrates that the three major clades of dinosaurs, Ornithischia, Sauropodomorpha, and Theropoda, were characterized by warm body temperatures. Dwarf titanosaurs may have exhibited similar body temperatures to larger sauropods, although this conclusion isprovisional, given current uncertainties in taxonomic assignment of dwarf titanosaur eggshell. Our results nevertheless reveal that metabolically controlled thermoregulation was the ancestral condition for Dinosauria.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eggshell geochemistry reveals ancestral metabolic thermoregulation in Dinosauria

et al. 2020

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“…In both cases the change allows for a reduction in solar absorption during peak thermal stress, allowing for higher metabolic rates during the day [101]. Our [125]). This supports the idea that insulatory epidermal structures were a plausible thermoregulatory solution for Coelophysis [126][127][128] despite the absence of skin impressions in basal theropods.…”

Section: Coelophysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Modeling Dragons: Using linked mechanistic physiological and microclimate models to explore environmental, physiological, and morphological constraints on the early evolution of dinosaurs

Lovelace

Hartman

Mathewson

et al. 2019

Preprint

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We employed the widely-tested biophysiological modeling software, Niche Mapper™ to investigate the metabolic function of Late Triassic dinosaurs Plateosaurus and Coelophysis during global greenhouse conditions. We tested them under a variety of assumptions about resting metabolic rate, evaluated within six microclimate models that bound paleoenvironmental conditions at 12° N paleolatitude, as determined by sedimentological and isotopic proxies for climate within the Chinle Formation of the southwestern United States. Sensitivity testing of metabolic variables and simulated "metabolic chamber" analyses support elevated "ratite-like" metabolic rates and intermediate "monotreme-like" core temperature ranges in these species of early saurischian dinosaur. Our results suggest small theropods may have needed partial to full epidermal insulation in temperate environments, while fully grown prosauropods would have likely been heat stressed in open, hot environments and should have been restricted to cooler microclimates such as dense forests (under any vegitative cover) or those seen at higher latitudes and elevations. This is in agreement with the Late

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“…Even with these significant new fossils and associated data, important issues such as when the first feathers evolved [7] and the microscopic composition of early feathers [8] remain unclear ( Fig. 1), although two recent studies provide new information on these issues [9,10].…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The first study, published in Nature Ecology and Evolution by Yang et al [9], presents unexpected new data relevant to the evolution of the earliest feathers. Although numerous feathered dinosaur fossils have been discovered over the last twenty years, they are mostly restricted to the clade Tetanurae [2] (a major theropod sub-group within which birds are deeply nested), suggesting that feathers originated within theropod dinosaurs.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%