21-427: Nyctosauridae (meaning "night lizards" or "bat lizards") is a family of specialized soaring pterosaurs of the late Cretaceous Period of North America , Africa , and possibly other continents including South America . It was named in 1889 by Henry Alleyne Nicholson and Richard Lydekker . Nyctosaurids are characterized by their lack of all but the wing finger. In most pterosaurs, the hand has four fingers, with
42-554: A lack of widespread consensus within the scientific community for extended periods. The continual publication of new data and diverse opinions plays a crucial role in facilitating adjustments and ultimately reaching a consensus over time. The naming of families is codified by various international bodies using the following suffixes: The taxonomic term familia was first used by French botanist Pierre Magnol in his Prodromus historiae generalis plantarum, in quo familiae plantarum per tabulas disponuntur (1689) where he called
63-473: A second specimen was reported, MUDE CPC-494, again uncovered by a quarry worker, perhaps at the same site, and sold to a private collector. It was later acquired by the Museo del Desierto Saltillo . It consists of the right upper wing of a subadult individual, with about 81% of the length of the holotype. As its provenance probably consists of slightly older layers from the late Turonian and the remains are limited, it
84-423: A separate lineage. Analyses by David Unwin did indicate a close relationship between Pteranodon and Nyctosaurus , though he used the name Pteranodontia for the clade containing both genera. Both opinions were published before the discovery of the second definitively known nyctosaurid, Muzquizopteryx , in 2006. Most nyctosaurid fossils have been found in formations dating to the late Cretaceous period of
105-563: A strong wing musculature. The pteroid bone was long and pointed towards the neck, supporting a flight membrane. Muzquizopteryx was by its describers assigned to the Nyctosauridae . It would then be the oldest known member of the group and the smallest known; indeed the smallest adult Late Cretaceous pterosaur discovered until 2006. As Nyctosaurus is sometimes included with the Pteranodontidae , Muzquizopteryx too might be considered
126-579: Is derived from the Múzquiz district and a Greek πτέρυξ, pteryx , "wing". The specific name is derived from the state of Coahuila. Muzquizopteryx is based on holotype UNAM IGM 8621 , found in the El Rosario layers, early Coniacian -aged rocks. It consists of a nearly complete, articulated skeleton that includes soft tissue remains, among them long fossilised tendons along both sides of both lower arms. The specimen represents an adult individual. In 2012,
147-506: The Genera Plantarum of George Bentham and Joseph Dalton Hooker this word ordo was used for what now is given the rank of family. Families serve as valuable units for evolutionary, paleontological, and genetic studies due to their relatively greater stability compared to lower taxonomic levels like genera and species. Muzquizopteryx Muzquizopteryx is a genus of nyctosaurid pterodactyloid pterosaur from
168-669: The Maastrichtian : a single potentially nyctosaurid humerus (upper arm bone) from Mexico, "Nyctosaurus" lamegoi from Brazil, and a nyctosaurid complete wing-phalanx1, a claw (digit phalanx manus), and a partial ulna from Jordan. The Jordan specimen is of particular interest as it is the first record of a nyctosaurid from the Old World and represents the latest record of the family (uppermost Maastrichtian). Beginning in 2016, Nicholas Longrich, David Martill, and Brian Andres presented evidence of several nyctosaurid and pteranodontid species from
189-458: The Late Cretaceous period (early Coniacian stage) of what is now Coahuila , Mexico . In the 1990s, José Martínez Vásquez, a worker at the chalk quarry of El Rosario , uncovered a skeleton of a pterosaur. This he handed to a quarry official, who had it bricked in on the face of an office wall as a decorative piece. After its unique scientific value had been recognized in 2002, the specimen
210-542: The family Juglandaceae , but that family is commonly referred to as the "walnut family". The delineation of what constitutes a family— or whether a described family should be acknowledged— is established and decided upon by active taxonomists . There are not strict regulations for outlining or acknowledging a family, yet in the realm of plants, these classifications often rely on both the vegetative and reproductive characteristics of plant species. Taxonomists frequently hold varying perspectives on these descriptions, leading to
231-530: The family as a rank intermediate between order and genus was introduced by Pierre André Latreille in his Précis des caractères génériques des insectes, disposés dans un ordre naturel (1796). He used families (some of them were not named) in some but not in all his orders of "insects" (which then included all arthropods ). In nineteenth-century works such as the Prodromus of Augustin Pyramus de Candolle and
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#1732858458430252-435: The fourth elongated to support the wing, and the remaining three are usually small, clawed, and used in walking or climbing. The lack of functional fingers in nyctosaurids may suggest that they spent almost all of their time in the air, rarely walking on the ground. Nyctosaurids also possessed a distinctively enlarged crest for muscle attachment on their upper arm bone, or humerus, the deltopectoral crest , hatchet shaped like in
273-502: The latest Maastrichtian age of north Africa, suggesting that these lineages went through an evolutionary radiation in the Old World shortly before the K-Pg extinction event. Three of these pterosaurs were named in 2018, and were called Alcione , Barbaridactylus , and Simurghia . In 2022, Fernandes et al. described Epapatelo as a new pteranodontian from Angola. Including Epapatelo in
294-708: The phylogenetic analysis of Longrich et al . (2018), they recovered a new clade, Aponyctosauria , composed of the Nyctosauridae, Alcione , Simurghia , and Epapatelo . Tethydraco Pteranodon longiceps Pteranodon sternbergi ( Geosternbergia ) Alamodactylus Volgadraco Cretornis Epapatelo Simurghia Alcione Muzquizopteryx Nyctosaurus lamegoi Nyctosaurus grandis ( Barbaridactylus ) Nyctosaurus nanus Nyctosaurus gracilis In 2024, Alcione , Simurghia , and Epapatelo were referred to as members of Nyctosauridae based on phylogenetic analysis, and "N." lamegoi
315-567: The seventy-six groups of plants he recognised in his tables families ( familiae ). The concept of rank at that time was not yet settled, and in the preface to the Prodromus Magnol spoke of uniting his families into larger genera , which is far from how the term is used today. In his work Philosophia Botanica published in 1751, Carl Linnaeus employed the term familia to categorize significant plant groups such as trees , herbs , ferns , palms , and so on. Notably, he restricted
336-510: The unrelated rhamphorhynchids . Nyctosaurids are generally characterized as specialized, pelagic soarers like frigatebirds ; however, the Alcione species appear to have had shorter wings and possibly have been divers like some modern piscivorous birds. Nyctosaurids have occasionally been included in the similar family Pteranodontidae , though researchers including Christopher Bennett and Alexander Kellner have both concluded that they belonged to
357-541: The use of this term solely within the book's morphological section, where he delved into discussions regarding the vegetative and generative aspects of plants. Subsequently, in French botanical publications, from Michel Adanson 's Familles naturelles des plantes (1763) and until the end of the 19th century, the word famille was used as a French equivalent of the Latin ordo (or ordo naturalis ). In zoology ,
378-567: The western United States and Mexico . Nyctosaurus dates from 85-84.5 million years ago, in the Niobrara Formation of Kansas . Muzquizopteryx is the oldest nyctosaurid known from definitive remains, dating to the Turonian - Coniacian boundary in Coahuila . A possible nyctosaurid specimen from Europe has been reclassified as an azhdarchoid. Before the late 2010s, three forms were known from
399-604: Was acquired by the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México . Subsequently, it was studied by a combined team of the University of Karlsruhe and the Desert Museum and scientifically reported in 2004. In 2006, the type species Muzquizopteryx coahuilensis was named and described by Eberhard Frey , Marie-Céline Buchy , Wolfgang Stinnesbeck , Arturo González-González and Alfredo di Stefano . The generic name
420-625: Was included as a species of Simurghia . [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED] Family (biology) Family ( Latin : familia , pl. : familiae ) is one of the eight major hierarchical taxonomic ranks in Linnaean taxonomy . It is classified between order and genus . A family may be divided into subfamilies , which are intermediate ranks between the ranks of family and genus. The official family names are Latin in origin; however, popular names are often used: for example, walnut trees and hickory trees belong to
441-430: Was referred to as cf. Muzquizopteryx sp. Muzquizopteryx was relatively small for a pterodactyloid pterosaur, with a wingspan of around 2 meters (6.6 ft). It had an elongated head with a convex upper profile, ending at the back of the head in a backward pointing short rounded crest. The jaws were toothless. The arms were very robust with the humerus featuring a large hatchet-shaped deltopectoral crest, indicating
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