First detailed postcranial anatomy supporting Jeholosaurus as a basal ornithopod
Phylogenetic relationships among basal ornithopod dinosaurs are poorly understood and the published tree topologies for these taxa, and other basal cerapodans, have only weak statistical support. Jeholosaurus shangyuanensis is a small ornithischian dinosaur from the Lower Cretaceous Yixian Formation of the Lujiatun locality, Liaoning Province, China. A recent study published in the journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 32(6) provides the first detailed description of its postcranial skeleton based on the holotype and four other well-preserved skeletons. A phylogenetic analysis incorporating these new postcranial data confirms previous suggestions that Jeholosaurus is a basal ornithopod, and indicates that it forms a clade with Changchunsaurus and Haya. The name Jeholosauridae is proposed for this apparently endemic group of Cretaceous East Asian taxa.