Re: FEDUCCIA AND THE NEW YIXIAN DINOS/ Velocipraptorinae unseated!

[Phillip Bigelow <bh162@scn.org>]

Tetanurae@aol.com wrote:

snippage...
> Although Currie, Padian, Chiappe, Gauthier, Ostrom etc certainly are correct
> that the closest non-bird relatives of birds are velociraptorine theropods,

I had to double-check on this to see if Velocipraptorinae is an inclusive clade
but it ain't, so....

(My how fast things change these days....) The Ji et al. paper has 
_Caudipteryx_ as
the NEW closest non-bird relative of birds.  Velocraptorinae has been unseated
from that title!  They also have a new, as yet unnamed clade that includes 
_Caudipteryx_
+ Avialae.  But _Caudipteryx_ is now the closest sister taxon to the clade 
Avialae
(well, at least it is if one uses their data matrix...).

Their newly- (or soon to be) published cladogram is on the Web in all it's 
glory:

http://www.nature.com/Nature2/serve?SID=25602728&CAT=NatGen&PG=dino/dino3_fig9.html


> perhaps it would be a good idea for them to remind reporters that not everyone
> agrees with the ground up hypothesis, or for reporters to interview someone
> like Greg Paul (who was at the press conference).

Agreed.  And on a slightly different topic, since this was sort of an important
science press conference, I do hope that either Currie or Norell, while at the 
podium,
acknowledged GSP and Ostrom, sitting in the audience, to the press.  It's the 
least that
could be done.
                          <pb>