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Multiple optimality criteria support Ornithoscelida

Abstract:
A recent study of early dinosaur evolution using equal-weights parsimony recovered a scheme of dinosaur interrelationships and classification that differed from historical consensus in a single, but significant, respect; Ornithischia and Saurischia were not recovered as monophyletic sister-taxa, but rather Ornithischia and Theropoda formed a novel clade named Ornithoscelida. However, these analyses only used maximum parsimony, and numerous recent simulation studies have questioned the accuracy of parsimony under equal weights. Here, we provide additional support for this alternative hypothesis using Bayesian implementation of the Mkv model, as well as through number of additional parsimony analyses, including implied weighting. Using Bayesian inference and implied weighting, we recover the same fundamental topology for Dinosauria as the original study, with a monophyletic Ornithoscelida, demonstrating that the main suite of methods used in morphological phylogenetics recover this novel hypothesis. This result was further scrutinized through the systematic exclusion of different character sets. Novel characters from the original study (those not taken or adapted from previous phylogenetic studies) were found to be more important for resolving the relationships within Dinosauromorpha than the relationships within Dinosauria. Reanalysis of a modified version of the character matrix that supports the Ornithischia–Saurischia dichotomy under maximum parsimony also supports this hypothesis under implied weighting, but not under the Mkv model, with both Theropoda and Sauropodomorpha becoming paraphyletic with respect to Ornithischia.
Publication status:
Published
Peer review status:
Peer reviewed

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Publisher copy:
10.1098/rsos.170833

Authors

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Institution:
University of Oxford
Division:
College Only
Oxford college:
St Edmund Hall
Role:
Author
ORCID:
0000-0002-3910-0346
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Role:
Author
ORCID:
0000-0001-9069-7638
More by this author
Role:
Author
ORCID:
0000-0002-3584-9616


Publisher:
The Royal Society
Journal:
Royal Society Open Science More from this journal
Volume:
4
Issue:
10
Pages:
170833-170833
Publication date:
2017-10-25
Acceptance date:
2017-09-25
DOI:
EISSN:
2054-5703


Language:
English
Keywords:
Pubs id:
1097795
Local pid:
pubs:1097795
Deposit date:
2020-04-06
ARK identifier:

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