Archaeopteryx and the story of ruffled feathers

[ITdactyl]

So the gist of the story is: the name Archaeopteryx lithographica was given to the fossil feather as the species holotype.  However, new studies indicate the feather may not be from an "Archaeopteryx" after all.

So, uh, what happens to the name?*

https://bigthink.com/surprising-science/did-dinosaurs-have-feathers

link to the paper:  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-37343-7

*as a casual enthusiast, I'm curious how the naming conventions work.  Does the 'owner' of the feather retain the name Archaeopteryx lithographica, and all archies get another name?

[stargatedalek]

I doubt this is even conclusive evidence that the feather was not from an Archaeopteryx, as there seemingly nothing truly distinguishing about it aside from its size. With such small sample sizes of extinct animals it's silly to assign new ones over slight differences like that.

Assuming this was enough to call it a new species, the feather would probably take the species name as priority. However, the genus name is so strongly associated with the other specimens that they would likely be given priority.

[suspsy]

Yeah, this strikes me as similar to the Tyrannosaurus rex/Manospondylus controversy. I seriously doubt the paleontological community will assign a new name to Archaeopteryx.

[ITdactyl]

first post edited with link to paper.

@stargatedalek , agreed.  On that note, apparently the authors of the paper merely raised the possibility that the feather may not have come from the animal we know as Archaeopteryx.  It was the BigThink article that gave the impression that it's a definitive case.

*makes me wonder, are media employees required to make every bit of news "cut and dried"

[Faelrin]

So does this mean to take the black coloration with a grain of salt (not impossible, but possible it could be different if this is actually not a feather from it)?

[Sim]

Um, this doesn't seem to be anything new?  That the single feather might not be from the same animal as the skeletons has been known for a long time, and because of this a neotype for Archaeopteryx was created by the ICZN in 2011.  The neotype is a skeleton with feathers, specifically the London specimen.  My understanding is the name Archaeopteryx is now attached to the London specimen, so if the single feather is from a different animal then it's the single feather that gets a new name.  The process that led to the creation of the neotype is described on the Archaeopteryx Wikipedia page, under the "Classification" section: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeopteryx