RE: Alioramus

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <tholtz@geol.umd.edu>]

An Alio-update:

Please note: the next year or so should see revisions in essentially all
things tyrannosauroid.  Expect major osteological and taxonomic revisions of
nearly every currently named (and a soon-to-be named or two) tyrant.

Without spilling other peoples beans, I can at least say that for my part,
_Alioramus_ NOW comes out in my analyses as the sister group to
albertosaurines + tyrannosaurines OR as a tyrannosaurine closer to
_Tyrannosaurus_ and _Tarbosaurus_ than to all others.  Currie, Hurum and
Sabath have an alternative arrangement.

The ontogenetic status of _Alioramus_ is less certain than one might think;
additionally, several published anatomical descriptions of it are
less-than-accurate given new studies.

Or, in other words, wait for the papers... :-)

>   Holtz also included *Siamotyannus* in his matrix, and it came out basal
> to all other tyrannosaurs; no non-coelurosaurs were included in the
> matrix, which makes this matrix difficult to test the theory of a
> carnosaur relationship for *Siamotyrannus*.

Indeed.  However, my new studies (including, for example, my 2001 SVP
presentation) find _Siamo._ to be a basal carnosaur rather than a
tyrannosauroid.

> He also included
> *Shanshanosaurus*, but this taxon has been indicated to possess several
> juvenile features and is probably a juvenile specimen of *Tarbosaurus*
> (Dong and Currie, 2002).
>
Bingo.

                Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
                Vertebrate Paleontologist
Department of Geology           Director, Earth, Life & Time Program
University of Maryland          College Park Scholars
                College Park, MD  20742
http://www.geol.umd.edu/~tholtz/tholtz.htm
http://www.geol.umd.edu/~jmerck/eltsite
Phone:  301-405-4084    Email:  tholtz@geol.umd.edu
Fax (Geol):  301-314-9661       Fax (CPS-ELT): 301-405-0796