Archaeopterodactyloidea

Archaeopterodactyloidea (meaning "ancient Pterodactyloidea") is an extinct clade of pterodactyloid pterosaurs that lived from the middle Late Jurassic to the latest Early Cretaceous periods (Kimmeridgian to Albian stages) of Africa, Asia, Europe and North America. It was named by Alexander Wilhelm Armin Kellner in 1996 as the group that contains Germanodactylus, Pterodactylus, the Ctenochasmatidae and the Gallodactylidae. Some researchers dispute the relationship of Germanodactylus to other members of the group, and instead use the terms Euctenochasmatia or Ctenochasmatoidea to describe the lineage of Pterodactylus, gallodactylids, and ctenochasmatids.

The earliest known archaeopterodactyloid remains date to the Late Jurassic Kimmeridgian age. Previously, a fossil jaw recovered from the Middle Jurassic Stonesfield Slate formation in the United Kingdom, was considered the oldest known. This specimen supposedly represented a member of the family Ctenochasmatidae, though further examination suggested it belonged to a teleosaurid crocodylomorph instead of a pterosaur.

Anatomy

Many archaeopterodactyloids had very distinctive features in comparison to other pterosaurs, including the shape of their jaws, as well as their highly specialized teeth. These teeth are thought to have been used for filter-feeding, the genus Pterodaustro for example, had a long snout and its lower jaws curve strongly upwards, and the tangent at the point of the snout was perpendicular to that of the jaw joint. Pterodaustro has around a thousand baleen-like teeth in its lower jaws that might have been used to strain crustaceans, plankton, algae, and other small creatures from the water. The teeth of Pterodaustro are unique within pterosaurs, and no other discovered genera had this type of teeth.