ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2021
Pterosaurs evolved a muscular wing-body junction providing multifaceted flight performance benefits: Advanced aerodynamic smoothing, sophisticated wing root control, and wing force generation.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed.
- Hidden artistic complexity of Peru's Chancay culture discovered in tattoos by laser-stimulated fluorescence.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Article
- New soft tissue data of pterosaur tail vane reveals sophisticated, dynamic tensioning usage and expands its evolutionary origins.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- Allometric wing growth links parental care to pterosaur giantism.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Quadrupedal water launch capability demonstrated in small Late Jurassic pterosaurs.Scientific reports · 2022Article
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
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Abstract
Pterosaurs were the first vertebrate flyers and lived for over 160 million years. However, aspects of their flight anatomy and flight performance remain unclear. Using laser-stimulated fluorescence, we observed direct soft tissue evidence of a wing root fairing in a pterosaur, a feature that smooths out the wing-body junction, reducing associated drag, as in modern aircraft and flying animals. Unlike bats and birds, the pterosaur wing root fairing was unique in being primarily made of muscle rather than fur or feathers. As a muscular feature, pterosaurs appear to have used their fairing to access further flight performance benefits through sophisticated control of their wing root and contributions to wing elevation and/or anterior wing motion during the flight stroke. This study underscores the value of using new instrumentation to fill knowledge gaps in pterosaur flight anatomy and evolution.
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