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[dinosaur] Confuciusornis rhamphotheca and early beak reconstruction (free pdf)




Ben Creisler
bcreisler@gmail.com

A new paper with free pdf:

Case Vincent Miller, Michael Pittman, Thomas G. Kaye, Xiaoli Wang, Jen A. Bright & Xiaoting Zheng (2020)
Disassociated rhamphotheca of fossil bird Confuciusornis informs early beak reconstruction, stress regime, and developmental patterns.
Communications Biology 3, Article number: 519
doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-020-01252-1
https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-020-01252-1

Free pdf:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-020-01252-1.pdf



Soft tissue preservation in fossil birds provides a rare window into their anatomy, function, and development. Here, we present an exceptionally-preserved specimen of Confuciusornis which, through Laser-Stimulated Fluorescence imaging, is identified as preserving a disassociated rhamphotheca. Reconstruction of the in vivo position of the rhamphotheca validates the association of the rhamphotheca with two previous confuciusornithid specimens while calling that of a third specimen into question. The ease of dissociation is discussed and proposed with a fourth specimen alongside finite element analysis as evidence for preferential soft-food feeding. However, this proposition remains tentative until there is a better understanding of the functional role of beak attachment in living birds. Differences in post-rostral extent and possibly rhamphotheca curvature between confuciusornithids and modern birds hint at developmental differences between the two. Together, this information provides a wealth of new information regarding the nature of the beak outside crown Aves.

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