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Saurornithoides

Reptilia - Troodontidae

Taxonomy
Saurornithoides was named by Osborn (1924). It was considered monophyletic by Currie (2000).

It was synonymized subjectively with Troodon by Paul (1988).

It was assigned to Megalosaurinidae by Osborn (1924); to Ornithomimidae by Huene (1927); to Dromaeosaurinae by Gilmore (1933); to Coelurosauria by Kuhn (1939) and Huene (1958); to Compsognathidae by Huene (1959) and Tatarinov (1964); to Theropoda by Ostrom (1965); to Coeluridae by Romer (1956), Estes (1964), Romer (1966) and Steel (1970); to Dromaeosauridae by Ostrom (1969) and Santafé et al. (1982); to Saurornithoididae by Barsbold (1974), Sues (1977), Rozhdestvensky (1977), Bonaparte (1978), Sues (1978), Molnar (1978), Lehman (1981), Barsbold (1983), Thulborn (1984), Carroll (1988) and Dong (1992); to Troodontidae by Russell (1969), Gauthier (1986), Currie (1992), Russell and Dong (1994), Currie and Peng (1994), Chure (1994), Varricchio (1997), Barsbold (1997), Currie (2000), Norell et al. (2000), Currie and Dong (2001), Chiappe (2002), Rauhut (2003), Makovicky et al. (2003), Senter et al. (2004), Makovicky and Norell (2004), Norell and Hwang (2004), Smith (2007), Averianov and Sues (2007), Novas et al. (2008), Norell et al. (2009), Bever and Norell (2009), Chanthasit and Buffetaut (2009), Longrich et al. (2010), Lü et al. (2010), Zanno et al. (2011), Porfiri et al. (2011), Xu et al. (2012), Godefroit et al. (2013), Tsuihiji et al. (2014), Delcourt and Grillo (2014), Williamson and Brusatte (2014) and Gianechini et al. (2017); and to Troodontinae by van der Reest and Currie (2017) and Sellés et al. (2021).

Species
S. mongoliensis

Synonymy list
YearName and author
1924Saurornithoides Osborn pp. 3-7 figs. 3-5
1927Saurornithoides Huene p. 272
1933Saurornithoides Gilmore p. 39
1939Saurornithoides Kuhn p. 57
1956Saurornithoides Romer p. 612
1958Saurornithoides Huene p. 205
1959Saurornithoides Huene p. 121
1964Saurornithoides Estes p. 142
1964Saurornithoides Tatarinov p. 533
1965Saurornithoides Ostrom p. 39
1966Saurornithoides Romer p. 369
1969Saurornithoides Ostrom p. 148
1969Saurornithoides Russell
1970Saurornithoides Steel p. 16
1974Saurornithoides Barsbold p. 7
1977Saurornithoides Rozhdestvensky p. 112
1977Saurornithoides Sues p. 591
1978Saurornithoides Bonaparte p. 466
1978Saurornithoides Molnar p. 81 fig. 10
1978Saurornithoides Sues pp. 399-400
1981Saurornithoides Lehman p. 202
1982Saurornithoides Santafé et al. p. 82
1983Saurornithoides Barsbold p. 87
1984Saurornithoides Thulborn p. 132
1986Saurornithoides Gauthier p. 11
1988Saurornithoides Carroll
1992Saurornithoides Currie p. 238
1992Saurornithoides Dong p. 164
1994Saurornithoides Chure p. 14
1994Saurornithoides Currie and Peng p. 2225
1994Saurornithoides Russell and Dong p. 2169
1997Saurornithoides Barsbold p. 448
1997Saurornithoides Varricchio p. 749
2000Saurornithoides Currie p. 444
2000Saurornithoides Norell et al. p. 10 fig. 3
2001Saurornithoides Currie and Dong p. 1764
2002Saurornithoides Chiappe p. 460
2003Saurornithoides Makovicky et al. p. 25 fig. 21
2003Saurornithoides Rauhut p. 42
2004Saurornithoides Makovicky and Norell p. 185
2004Saurornithoides Norell and Hwang p. 7
2004Saurornithoides Senter et al. p. 2 fig. 2
2007Saurornithoides Averianov and Sues p. 95
2007Saurornithoides Smith p. 104
2008Saurornithoides Novas et al.
2009Saurornithoides Bever and Norell p. 7 fig. 6
2009Saurornithoides Chanthasit and Buffetaut p. 150
2009Saurornithoides Norell et al. p. 4
2010Saurornithoides Longrich et al. p. 955
2010Saurornithoides Lü et al. p. 382
2011Saurornithoides Porfiri et al. p. 112
2011Saurornithoides Zanno et al. p. 15 fig. 15
2012Saurornithoides Xu et al. p. 141
2013Saurornithoides Godefroit et al.
2014Saurornithoides Delcourt and Grillo p. 312
2014Saurornithoides Tsuihiji et al. p. 139
2014Saurornithoides Williamson and Brusatte p. 13
2017Saurornithoides Gianechini et al. p. 8
2017Saurornithoides van der Reest and Currie p. 933
2021Saurornithoides Sellés et al. p. 6

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RankNameAuthor
kingdomAnimalia()
—Bilateria
—EubilateriaAx 1987
—Deuterostomia
phylumChordataHaeckel 1874
subphylumVertebrata
superclassGnathostomata
—Osteichthyes()
subclassSarcopterygii()
subclassDipnotetrapodomorpha(Nelson 2006)
subclassTetrapodomorpha()
—Tetrapoda
—Reptiliomorpha
—Anthracosauria
subclassAmphibiosauriaKuhn 1967
—Cotylosauria()
—Amniota
—Sauropsida
classReptilia
subclassEureptilia()
—Romeriida
—Diapsida()
RankNameAuthor
—Archosauromorpha(Huene 1946)
—Crocopoda
—ArchosauriformesGauthier 1986
—Eucrocopoda
—Archosauria()
informalAvemetatarsalia
—Ornithodira
—Dinosauromorpha
—Dinosauriformes
—Dinosauria()
—Theropoda()
—Neotheropoda
—AverostraPaul 2002
—Tetanurae
—Coelurosauria()
—Maniraptora
—Paraves
infraorderDeinonychosauria
familyTroodontidae
subfamilyTroodontinae
genusSaurornithoides

If no rank is listed, the taxon is considered an unranked clade in modern classifications. Ranks may be repeated or presented in the wrong order because authors working on different parts of the classification may disagree about how to rank taxa.

G. †Saurornithoides Osborn 1924
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Diagnosis
ReferenceDiagnosis
M. A. Norell et al. 2009Differs from Zanabazar junior in its smaller overall size, lower number of teeth (108 versus 118), the presence of a jugal that is straight beneath the round orbit rather than curved, and the possession of a pneumatic recess on the lateral surface of the prootic dorsal to the trigeminal fenestra (the pneumatic recess is also absent in Troodon formosus). The maxillary teeth of Saurornithoides exhibit some increase in crown height posteriorly but to a lesser degree than in Zanabazar junior. Also in contrast to Zanabazar junior, the maxillary teeth of Saurornithoides lack replacement gaps. In these latter two characters, Saurornithoides agrees with Mei long, Sinovenator changii, and basal avialans among paravians, whereas Zanabazar junior is more similar to Byronosaurus jaffei and dromaeosaurs.