Re: protoavis skeleton

["David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> > And i need picture of  protoaveis skeleton.<
>
> There are lots of drawings of the Protoavis skeleton in Sankar
Chatterjee's
> book, The Rise of Birds.  As I recall, however, there aren't any
photographs
> of the skeletal elements in that book [published 1997].

Photographs of skeletal fragments are included in Chatterjee's "1999"
(actually 1994!) paper

Sankar Chatterjee: *Protoavis* and the early evolution of birds,
Palaeontographica Abt. A 254, Lfg. 1 -- 3, 1 -- 100 (Oktober 1999)

Because of the low availability of this journal and the high importance of
this paper, I have summarized parts of it in
http://www.cmnh.org/fun/dinosaur-archive/2001Feb/msg00002.html and
http://www.cmnh.org/fun/dinosaur-archive/2001Feb/msg00352.html and will
continue this, erm, soon.

Whether evidence for feathers is preserved in *Protoavis* depends on what
the structures are that Chatterjee identifies as quill knobs. Of course, if
they are not quill knobs, then this doesn't tell anything, because
*Archaeopteryx* apparently doesn't have ones either. Feathers themselves
can't be preserved in that type of sediment.

I can send scans of the pages that contain the following figures to anyone
who asks:

Figures are drawings, plates are photos. I'll send the abbreviations
(inhumanely placed in the appendix) as an extra file with all drawings
except Fig. 1.

"Fig. 1. C: composite geologic section of the Dockum Group showing the two
stratigraphic levels of *Protoavis*."
Fig. 2, 3, 4 and 5: composite restoration of skull, 2 showing the skull in
lateral view and the quadrate, 3 showing the skull in dorsal, ventral and
occipital views, 4 and 5 showing the braincase.
"Table 1. Estimated skull and jaw dimensions (in mm) of Protoavis texensis
(based on TTU P 9200)."
"Table 2. Vertebral counts in various theropod species". Includes lots of
birds.
"Table 3. Measurements (in mm) of vertebrae of *Protoavis texensis*."
Fig. 6: Anterior cervical vertebrae of *Protoavis texensis* and *Aquila
chrysaetos*.
Fig. 7: Posterior cervical vertebrae of *P.*.
Fig. 8: Dorsal vertebrae of *P.*.
Fig. 9: Sacral and caudal vertebrae of *P.*.
"Fig. 10. Neural canal indices of various theropod genera. Note *Protoavis*
and modern birds have much higher NCI values (>60) than the condition in
nonavian theropods."
"Table 4. Measurements (in mm) of the elements of shoulder girdles of
*Protoavis texensis*."
Fig. 11: Scapula, coracoid, furcula and sternum of *P.*, with a comparison
to the furcula of a chicken.
Fig. 12: Composite restoration of the shoulder girdle plus comparison of
sternum to that of a chicken.
Fig. 13: Shoulder girdles of *Archaeopteryx*, *Iberomesornis* and
"Enantiornithes".
Fig. 14: Humeri.
Table 5: Measurements of arm bones.
Fig. 15: Forearm elements.
Table 6 (incorrectly labeled as 2): Measurements of elements of the right
hand.
Fig. 16: The odd hand of *P.*.
Fig. 17: Pelvis.
"Table 7. Preacetabular elongation (PE) indices of some nonavian theropods
and birds."
Fig. 18: Composite restorations of pelvic girdles of *P.*, "Enantiornithes",
a turkey and *Archaeopteryx* (still wrong with pubis pointing, say, 30°
backward).
Table 8: Measurements of pelvic elements. + Table 9: Measurements of leg
elements.
Fig. 19: Femora.
Fig. 20: Tibia, fibula and astragalocalcaneum (low ascending process, as in
figured *Alwalkeria*).
Table 1[0]: Measurements of elements of the (only known) foot.
Fig. 21: A composite restoration of a foot that cries "perching bird", plus
claw measurement studies.
Fig. 22: Composite skeletal restoration.
Fig. 23: Life restoration.
"Fig. 24. Lines of actions of some principal muscles of the pelvis and femur
of *Protoavis*; right lateral view."
"Table 11. Femora[sic]/tibiotarsal (FT) indices in some theropods."
"Fig. 25. Stick diagram showing the running posture of *Protoavis* [...]
Note movements of the knee, rather than femoral retraction, accounts for
most of the foot displacement."
Fig. 26: The wing in flexion and extension.
Fig. 27: Restorations of flight muscles in frontal view.
"Fig. 28. Scansorial adaptation of a hypothetical proavian maniraptoran
(similar to *Velociraptor*)"; the book says "protodromaeosaur", and in the
illustration there the skeleton lacks the large opposed hallux it has in the
article.
"Fig. 29. Evolution of avian coracoid showing the progressive transformation
of origin for M. biceps brachii and M. supracoracoideus."
"Fig. 30. Hypothetical stages for evolution of major forms of avian flight
in arboreal mode." This figure and its caption are much more detailed in the
book.
Fig. 31: Tip vortices in a proavian protodromaeosaur and *P.*. This
illustration has a modern bird for comparison in the book.
Fig. 32: Uninteresting simple cladogram of Dinosauria.
Fig. 33: Various historical cladograms of birds and their relatives:
Thulborn 1984, Gauthier 1986, Cracraft 1986, Sanz & Bonaparte 1992, Martin
1987, Chiappe & Calvo 1994, Sereno & Rao 1992, Perle et al. 1993.
Fig. 34: Skulls and temporal regions of *Archaeopteryx* (wrong -- has been
shown to have an ascending process on the jugal, ~ corrected in the book),
*Avimimus*, *Protoavis*, *Hesperornis* and *Ichthyornis*.
Fig. 35: Holotype of *Ambiortus dementjevi* as found, plus interpretations.
Fig. 36: A few bones of *Patagopteryx*.
Fig. 37: Most parsimonious cladogram that results from Table 12, a data
matrix for 84 characters and 14 taxa.
Fig. 38: The cladogram of Fig. 37 plotted with a time scale.

All plates, especially the stereophotographs, in meager quality:
Plate 1: holotype.
Plate 2: paratype.
Plate 3: 3D photos of cranial elements of the holotype.
Plate 4: same for paratype.
Plate 5: 3D photos of vertebrae.
Plate 6: same of shoulder girdle elements.
Plate 7: same of humeri.
Plate 8: same of forearm and hand elements.
Plate 9: same of pelvic and leg elements.
Plate 10: comparisons of ascending processes. Includes foot of *P.*.

Warning: These are monster files (1 -- 4 MB or so). Outlook Express,
respectively the server, regularly needs several attempts for sending, and
people who have slow modems, restrictions on the size of emails they can get
or whatever may run into problems.
I can send them as WinZip files, though.
They don't contain viruses! :-)