Megalosauroidea

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Megalosauroids
Temporal range: Middle Jurassic - Late Cretaceous, 170–85 Ma
PreꞒ
O
S
D
C
P
T
J
K
Pg
N
Possible Late Maastrichtian record
Torvosaurus Museum of Ancient Life 2.jpg
Torvosaurus skeletal mount, Museum of Ancient Life
Spinosaurus swimming.jpg
Spinosaurus skeletal mount, National Geographic Museum
Scientific classification e
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Dinosauria
Clade: Saurischia
Clade: Theropoda
Infraorder: Carnosauria (?)
Superfamily: Megalosauroidea
Huxley, 1889
Type species
Megalosaurus bucklandii
Mantell, 1827
Subgroups
  • ?Yunyangosaurus
  • Piatnitzkysauridae
  • Megalosauria
    • Streptospondylus
    • Megalosauridae
    • Spinosauridae
Synonyms
  • Spinosauroidea Stromer, 1915
  • Torvosauroidea Nopcsa, 1915
  • Spinosauria Olshevsky, 1991

Megalosauroidea (meaning 'great/big lizard forms') is a superfamily (or clade) of tetanuran theropod dinosaurs that lived from the Middle Jurassic to the Late Cretaceous period. The group is defined as Megalosaurus bucklandii and all taxa sharing a more recent common ancestor with it than with Allosaurus fragilis or Passer domesticus.[1] Members of the group include Spinosaurus, Megalosaurus, and Torvosaurus.

Classification[]

The name Spinosauroidea is sometimes used in place of Megalosauroidea. The superfamily Spinosauroidea was named in 1915 by Ernst Stromer. It is a synonym of Megalosauroidea in almost all modern phylogenetic analyses, and it is therefore redundant. Spinosauroidea was defined as a clade in 1998 by Paul Sereno as the node clade containing the common ancestor of Spinosaurus and Torvosaurus and all its descendants. Thomas Holtz in 2004 defined a branch clade with the same name containing all species closer to Spinosaurus than to Passer domesticus. The ICZN holds that even clade names (which do not yet have any governing body) should be replaced if having a traditional taxon suffix and being synonyms of ranked taxa at or below the superfamily level. The seniority of Megalosauroidea was not followed in most paleontological literature during the 1990s and early 2000s. A series of papers supporting the validity of Megalosaurus as a genus, the relationships of megalosauroids, and the placement of "spinosauroids" among them, published between 2008 and 2010 argued that Megalosauroidea was in fact the valid name for the group.[1]

The classification of megalosauroids follows a study by Benson in 2010. Note that several "wildcard"[1] taxa that are probably megalosauroids were excluded from the final tree, including Magnosaurus, Piveteausaurus and Streptospondylus.[1] Later, Magnosaurus and Streptospondylus were added in the final tree.[2] These are known from remains too fragmentary to be reliably classified.[1] Some of these 'wildcard' taxa, such as Poekilopleuron and Megaraptor, have been considered possible megalosauroids in the past, but the analysis found that they are more likely allosauroids.[2]

Megalosauroidea

Xuanhanosaurus

Marshosaurus

Condorraptor

Piatnitzkysaurus

Chuandongocoelurus

Monolophosaurus Monolophosaurus jiangi White Background.jpg

Spinosauridae

Baryonyx

Suchomimus Suchomimus white background.jpg

Irritator Irritator challengeri mount 01 white background.jpg

Spinosaurus Spinosaurus white background.jpg

Megalosauridae
Eustreptospondylinae

Eustreptospondylus

Magnosaurus

Streptospondylus

Megalosaurinae

Duriavenator

Afrovenator Afrovenator mount white background.jpg

Dubreuillosaurus

Megalosaurus

Torvosaurus Complete skeleton of Torvosaurus white background.jpg

Carrano, Benson & Sampson (2012) performed much larger phylogenetic analysis of the Tetanurae that includes more taxa. They used the clade name Megalosauria (Bonaparte, 1850) in their analysis and defined it as the node comprising Megalosaurus, Spinosaurus, their most recent common ancestor, and all its descendants. Furthermore, a new megalosauroid family Piatnitzkysauridae was named to include all megalosauroids more closely related to Piatnitzkysaurus than to either Spinosaurus or Megalosaurus. Within Megalosauridae a new subfamily was named, Afrovenatorinae, to include all megalosaurids more closely related to Afrovenator than to Megalosaurus. Unlike Benson et al., 2010, they recovered Poekilopleuron as an afrovenatorine, while Xuanhanosaurus was recovered as the basalmost metriacanthosaurid. However, the position of these taxa is very unstable, and their exclusion from the analysis gave more resolved and stable cladogram. Streptospondylus was also excluded to get more resolved Megalosauridae and Afrovenatorinae. The Chinese tetanuran Leshansaurus was included for the first time in a phylogenetic analysis, and was recovered as an afrovenatorine. Both Chuandongocoelurus and Monolophosaurus were found to be just outside Orionides. The cladogram presented here follows that study.[3]

Tetanurae

Cryolophosaurus Cryolophosaurus in Japan White Background.jpg

"Dilophosaurus" sinensis Sinosaurus triassicus white background.JPG

Chuandongocoelurus

Monolophosaurus Monolophosaurus jiangi White Background.jpg

Orionides
Avetheropoda

Allosauroidea Allosaurus AMNH White Background.jpg

Coelurosauria

Lourinhanosaurus

Other coelurosaurians FMNH Deinonychus white background.JPG

Megalosauroidea
Piatnitzkysauridae

Marshosaurus

Condorraptor

Piatnitzkysaurus

Megalosauria

Streptospondylus

Spinosauridae

Baryonyx

Suchomimus Suchomimus white background.jpg

Angaturama

Irritator Irritator challengeri mount 01 white background.jpg

Spinosaurus Spinosaurus white background.jpg

Megalosauridae
Eustreptospondylinae

Eustreptospondylus

Megalosaurinae

Duriavenator

Megalosaurus

Torvosaurus Complete skeleton of Torvosaurus white background.jpg

Afrovenatorinae

Afrovenator Afrovenator mount white background.jpg

Dubreuillosaurus

Magnosaurus

Leshansaurus

Piveteausaurus

In 2019, Rauhut and Pol described Asfaltovenator vialidadi, a basal allosauroid displaying a mosaic of primitive and derived features seen within Tetanurae. Their phylogenetic analysis found traditional Megalosauroidea to represent a basal grade of carnosaurs, paraphyletic with respect to Allosauroidea.[4]

Carnosauria

MonolophosaurusMonolophosaurus jiangi jmallon (flipped).jpg

SpinosauridaeSpinosaurus aegyptiacus.png

MegalosauridaeTorvosaurus tanner DBi.jpg

Allosauroidea

Xuanhanosaurus

PiatnitzkysauridaePiatnitzkysaurus floresi by Paleocolour.jpg

Asfaltovenator

MetriacanthosauridaeYangchuanosaurus NT (flipped).jpg

AllosaurusAllosaurus Revised.jpg

CarcharodontosauriaCarcharodontosaurus.png

traditional Megalosauroidea

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Benson, R.B.J. (2010). "A description of Megalosaurus bucklandii (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Bathonian of the UK and the relationships of Middle Jurassic theropods". Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. 158 (4): 882–935. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.2009.00569.x.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b Benson, R.B.J., Carrano, M.T and Brusatte, S.L. (2010). "A new clade of archaic large-bodied predatory dinosaurs (Theropoda: Allosauroidea) that survived to the latest Mesozoic". Naturwissenschaften. 97 (1): 71–78. Bibcode:2010NW.....97...71B. doi:10.1007/s00114-009-0614-x. PMID 19826771.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) Supporting Information
  3. ^ Carrano, M. T.; Benson, R. B. J.; Sampson, S. D. (2012). "The phylogeny of Tetanurae (Dinosauria: Theropoda)". Journal of Systematic Palaeontology. 10 (2): 211–300. doi:10.1080/14772019.2011.630927.
  4. ^ Rauhut, Oliver W. M.; Pol, Diego (2019-12-11). "Probable basal allosauroid from the early Middle Jurassic Cañadón Asfalto Formation of Argentina highlights phylogenetic uncertainty in tetanuran theropod dinosaurs". Scientific Reports. 9 (1): 18826. doi:10.1038/s41598-019-53672-7. ISSN 2045-2322. PMC 6906444. PMID 31827108.
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