Archaeopterodactyloidea

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. A peculiar family within this group is the Ctenochasmatidae, which most of the members had very distinguishing teeth that were lined within their elongated snouts. A genus called Pterofiltrus only had 112 teeth, but these teeth cover about 55.8% of the total skull, and the skull itself measured about in length. Other members of this group, such as the gallodactylids, differ from other euctenochasmatians in several distinct features, including having fewer than 50 teeth, and were only present in the jaw tips; rounded crests were also present on the rear portion of the skull and jaws but not near the ends of their snouts. Similarly, the ctenochasmatid Feilongus also had its teeth confined within its jaw tips, as well as having crests on the rear portion of the skull and jaws, but differed Feilongus from the gallodactylids by having a possible pronounced overbite, and 76 teeth, which were needle-like. One of the largest toothed pterosaurs was Moganopterus, it was, yet again, a ctenochasmatid, and was similar in build to Feilongus. What made Moganopterus distinct was its size; while Feilongus had a wingspan of about , Moganopterus had an impressive wingspan of more than , making it more than three times larger than Feilongus. ==Behavior and ecology==

Lusognathus Most archaeopterodactyloids have wing proportions akin to those of modern shorebirds and ducks, and probably possessed a similar frantic, powerful flight style. The exception is Ctenochasma, which appears to have had longer wings and was probably more comparable to modern skuas. The exception to their occurrence in coastal settings are the gallodactylids, which generally possessed more slender limbs and shorter torsos. They occupied a wide variety of ecological niches, from generalistic carnivores like Pterodactylus to filter-feeders like Pterodaustro and possible molluscivores like Cycnorhamphus. Most common, however, were straight-jawed, needle-toothed forms, some of the most notable being Ctenochasma and Gnathosaurus; these possibly occupied an ecological niche akin to that of modern spoonbills, their teeth forming spatula-like jaw profile extensions, allowing them a larger surface area to catch individual small prey. ==Classification==

Gladocephaloideus in a coastal environment In 2003, Kellner defined Archaeopterodactyloidea as a node-based taxon consisting of the last common ancestor of Pterodactylus, Ctenochasma and Gallodactylus and all its descendants. Although phylogenetic analyses that based on David Unwin's 2003 analysis do not recover monophyletic Archaeopterodactyloidea, phylogenetic analyses that based on Kellner's analyses, or the analyses of Brian Andres (2008, 2010, 2018) recover monophyletic Archaeopterodactyloidea at the base of the Pterodactyloidea. The largest subgroup of archaeopterodactyloids is the group Euctenochasmatia. This group was named by David Unwin in 2003 as the group that contains the most recent common ancestor of Pterodactylus and Ctenochasma, and all their descendants. Another subgroup within Archaeopterodactyloidea is Ctenochasmatoidea. Ctenochasmatoidea was first named as the subfamily Ctenochasmatinae by Franz Nopcsa. Under the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, this makes Nopcsa the author of Ctenochasmatidae and Ctenochasmatoidea as well. The modern clade Ctenochasmatoidea was defined by David Unwin in 2003 as the clade containing Cycnorhamphus suevicus, Pterodaustro guinazui, their most recent common ancestor, and all its descendants. Below is a cladogram showing the results of a phylogenetic analysis presented by Steven Vidovic and David Martill, using the earliest available definitions for each clade name. In 2017, Steven Vidovic and David Martill recovered a significantly different set of relationships for early pterodactyloids in their own analysis. They recovered Archaeopterodactyloidea, as it is traditionally conceived of, as a paraphyletic group. Under a strictly cladistical framework, this would imply that the majority of pterodactyloids are part of Archaeopterodactyloidea, including azhdarchoids, pteranodontians, and ornithocheiromorphs. }} ==Subclades==

Summary of the given phylogenetic definitions of clades in Archaeopterodactyloidea. ==See also==