Coelurosauravus

Coelurosauravus gliding

  • C. elivensis PIVETEAU, 1926
  • C. jaekeli ( WEIGELT, 1930)

Coelurosauravus was a primitive Diapside whose fossils have been found in Upper Permian sedimentary rocks of Madagascar, Germany and England.

Similar Kuehneosaurus, Icarosaurus, Sharovipteryx, the Mecistotrachelos recently described and the recent kites had Coelurosauravus wing membranes, which enabled him to glide. Unlike all the other Gleitreptilien the wing membranes were not spanned by bone at Coelurosauravus that were already present at the non- gleitfliegenden ancestors ( extended limbs or ribs). Instead, it is in the 28 pairs of curved bony rods that ansetzten the rib cage laterally to completely newly created structures. These bone rods were formed in the skin ( dermal). Such skin bones come in numerous reptiles, etc. Crocodiles before. There, they are referred to as ( osteoderms ) and are mostly one of a kind armor.

Since the first description of originating from the freshwater sediments of the Malagasy Sakamena lineup Coelurosauravus elivensis in 1926 by Jean Piveteau the taxon Coelurosauravus have been assigned more than twenty fossil specimens. An identified in the Kupferschiefer at Eisleben skeleton, which was acquired in 1913 by Otto Jaekel for the collection of the University of Greifswald, described John Weigelt 1930 Paleochamaeleo jaekeli. Although the copy Jaekel at that time was offered as a " pterodactyl " Weigelt interpreted the bone rods of Gleitschwingen than randomly embedded along with the reptile skeleton of a coelacanth fin rays. Since the genus name Paleochamaeleo was already taken for a fossil Agamengattung, later it was renamed the Weigeltisaurus jaekeli. In 1987, all the finds of Weigeltisaurus and Coelurosauravus and also the 1930 ottoi described by Weigelt as Gracilisaurus copy of a re-evaluation were subjected and united in the genus with the type species Coelurosauravus Coelurosauravus elivensis.

In a phylogenetic analysis Coelurosauravus was associated with Longisquama and Drepanosauriden the group Avicephala, which stands outside the Neodiapsida. This means that Coelurosauravus is more closely related to distance scaled reptiles, crocodiles and birds.

195926
de