Hyperelongate ornamental tail feathers in a new early Cretaceous enantiornithine bird

Alexander D. Clark; Jingmai K. O’Connor; Xiaoli Wang; Yan Wang; Stephen Pruett-Jones; Xiangyu Zhang; Xing Wang; Xiaoting Zheng; Zhonghe Zhou

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0347641

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Open Access

Peer-reviewed

Research Article

Hyperelongate ornamental tail feathers in a new early Cretaceous enantiornithine bird

Alexander D. Clark ,

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Visualization, Writing – original draft

* E-mail: adclark@uchicago.edu (ADC); wang_7355@163.com (XW)

Affiliations Committee on Evolutionary Biology, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America, Negaunee Integrative Resource Center, Field Museum of Natural History, S Dusable Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4310-3408

⨯
Jingmai K. O’Connor,

Roles Conceptualization, Investigation, Methodology, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Negaunee Integrative Resource Center, Field Museum of Natural History, S Dusable Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America
⨯
Xiaoli Wang ,

Roles Conceptualization

* E-mail: adclark@uchicago.edu (ADC); wang_7355@163.com (XW)

Affiliations School of life Sciences, Lingyi University, Lingyi, China, Shandong Tianyu Museum of Nature, Pingyi, China
⨯
Yan Wang,

Roles Conceptualization

Affiliations School of life Sciences, Lingyi University, Lingyi, China, Shandong Tianyu Museum of Nature, Pingyi, China, Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America
⨯
Stephen Pruett-Jones,

Roles Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America
⨯
Xiangyu Zhang,

Roles Conceptualization

Affiliations School of life Sciences, Lingyi University, Lingyi, China, Shandong Tianyu Museum of Nature, Pingyi, China
⨯
Xing Wang,

Roles Conceptualization

Affiliations School of life Sciences, Lingyi University, Lingyi, China, Shandong Tianyu Museum of Nature, Pingyi, China
⨯
Xiaoting Zheng,

Roles Conceptualization

Affiliations School of life Sciences, Lingyi University, Lingyi, China, Shandong Tianyu Museum of Nature, Pingyi, China
⨯
Zhonghe Zhou

Roles Conceptualization

Affiliations Key Laboratory of Vertebrate Evolution and Human Origins of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Beijing, China, Chinese Academy of Sciences Center for Excellence in Life and Paleoenvironment, Beijing, China
⨯

Hyperelongate ornamental tail feathers in a new early Cretaceous enantiornithine bird

Alexander D. Clark,
Jingmai K. O’Connor,
Xiaoli Wang,
Yan Wang,
Stephen Pruett-Jones,
Xiangyu Zhang,
Xing Wang,
Xiaoting Zheng,
Zhonghe Zhou

Published: May 27, 2026
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0347641

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Feathers
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Cretaceous period
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Soft tissues
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