Paravian Phylogeny and the Dinosaur-Bird Transition: An Overview

Recent years witnessed the discovery of a great diversity of early birds as well as closely related non-avian theropods, which modified previous conceptions about the origin of birds and their flight. We here present a review of currently the taxonomic composition and main anatomical characteristics of those theropod families closely related with early birds, with the aim to analyze and discuss main phylogenetic hypotheses that compete some...