Banji

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Banji
Temporal occurrence
Upper Cretaceous ( Maastrichtian )
72 to 66 million years
Locations
Systematics
Theropoda
Coelurosauria
Maniraptora
Oviraptorosauria
Oviraptoridae
Banji
Scientific name
Banji
Xu & Han , 2010
Art
  • Banji long

Banji was a theropod dinosaur from the group of oviraptorosauria who in the Upper Cretaceous lived in China. This genus is known for a single, almost complete skull, which probably comes from the Nanxiong Formation in the Chinese province of Jiangxi , although the exact location is not known.

Banji was scientifically described in 2010 with the only species Banji long . Like other oviraptorids, it had a deep, toothless jaw that was shaped into a beak. In contrast to related genera, the bony crest of the skull showed a step-like end. Presumably it was herbivorous or omnivorous . Within the Oviraptorosauria, Banji is one of the Oviraptoridae .

features

The skull found is small at 6.5 cm in length. Since some skull bones were not yet fused, it is assumed that it was a juvenile.

Banji showed the short and deep skull typical of oviraptorids, with nostrils located high up (nar), a small antorbital pit (the skull depression in front of the eyes (afe)), a large infratemporal window (a skull window behind the eyes (itf)) and a large one , bony crest of the skull. In contrast to other oviraptorids, the crest of the skull is mainly formed by the intermaxillary bone (premaxillary (pm)) and ends in a step above the eye sockets. The crest shows two elongated pits (gpn) on each side as well as numerous grooves. The nostrils were extremely elongated and followed the curvature of the ridge up to the vicinity of the eye sockets (or). Other unique features ( autapomorphies ) are a deep depression on the wing bone (pterygoid), various elongated pits on the dental (a lower jaw bone (d)), as well as tubercle-like structures (saf + ts) on the surangular .

Systematics

Various primitive features of the palate and jawbones show that Banji occupied a basal position within the Oviraptoridae. Some of these basic features could be of an ontogenic nature, i.e. due to the fact that the individual found is a young animal. However, the individual development of oviraptorids is currently insufficiently known. An analysis of the descriptors, which includes all, also potentially ontogenetically determined characteristics, showed that Banji was the most basic representative of the Oviraptoridae after Gigantoraptor .

Find and naming

The researchers acquired the skull from an amateur fossil collector, who stated the location of the find as the Hongcheng Basin near Ganzhou in the Chinese province of Jiangxi , but did not provide any details about the location. However, the skull probably comes from the Nanxiong Formation and is therefore around 65 million years old ( Maastrichtian ). The skull ( holotype , copy number IVPP V 16896) is almost completely preserved, including the jawbone, and is now kept in the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology in Beijing . An embryonic skeleton of an oviraptorid (Cheng et al. , 2008), also from the Hongcheng Basin, could also belong to Banji - since no skull bones have been preserved in this find, only further findings can bring clarity.

The name Banji means something like "striped comb" ( Chinese ban - "stripes", ji - "comb") and refers to the grooves of the skull crest of this genus. The species name long also comes from Chinese and means "dragon".

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Shuo Wang, Chengkai Sun, Corwin Sullivan, Xing Xu: A new oviraptorid (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Upper Cretaceous of southern China. In: Zootaxa . Vol. 3640, No. 2, 2013, ISSN  1175-5326 , pp. 242-257, doi : 10.11646 / zootaxa.3640.2.7 , digital version (PDF; 774 kB) .