Huanansaurus

Huanansaurus; Temporal range: Ma PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
	Skull of holotype specimen
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Clade:	Dinosauria
Clade:	Saurischia
Clade:	Theropoda
Family:	†Oviraptoridae
Genus:	†Huanansaurus; Lü et al., 2015
Species:	†H. ganzhouensis
Binomial name
	†Huanansaurus ganzhouensis; Lü et al., 2015

Huanansaurus is an

extinct genus of oviraptorid dinosaur that lived approximately 72 million years ago, between the Campanian and Maastrichtian, during the latter part of the Cretaceous period in what is now China, in the Nanxiong Formation.^[1]

Discovery and designation

The skeleton of a new oviraptorid Huanansaurus ganzhouensis was uncovered during the construction of the Ganzhou railway station in Jiangxi province, China.^[1]

In 2015, Lü Junchang, Pu Hanyong, Yoshitsugu Kobayashi, Xu Li, Chang Huali, Shang Yuhua, Liu Di, Lee Yuong-Nam, Martin Kundrát and Shen Caizhi named and described the type species Huanansaurus ganzhouensis. The generic name is derived from Huanan, "Southern China". The specific name refers to the provenance from Ganzhou.^[1] Huanansaurus was one of eighteen dinosaur taxa from 2015 to be described in open access or free-to-read journals.^[2]

The

Henan Geological Museum at Zhengzhou.^[1]

Description

Some unique traits of Huanansaurus have been established. Several of these are

dentary bone is pneumatised. The lower rear branch of the dentary is twisted, causing its outer side to be somewhat directed to below. The first metacarpal is long and slender with its transverse width equal to a fifth of its length. The hand claws have prominent lips on their upper rears.^[1]

In addition, a unique combination of in themselves not unique traits is present. The temporal opening on the skull roof is round and much smaller than the temporal opening of the skull side. The rear branch of the

praemaxilla touches the lacrimal bone and features a prominent opening at this point, on the rear underside. The upper rear branch of the dentary covers the outer side opening of the lower jaw and has a concave lower rim.^[1]

Huanansaurus was, within the

phylogenetic analysis of Lü et al. (2017).^[3]

Oviraptoridae

Nankangia jiangxiensis