''Iteravis'' ("journey bird") is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

ornithuromorph Euornithes (from Greek ' meaning "true birds") is a natural group which includes the most recent common ancestor of all avialans closer to modern birds than to the enantiornithines. This group was defined in the ''PhyloCode'' by Juan Benito and ...

avialan Avialae ("bird wings") is a clade containing the only living dinosaurs, the birds, and their closest relatives. It is usually defined as all theropod dinosaurs more closely related to birds (Aves) than to deinonychosaurs, though alternative defi ...

. It was found in the

Yixian Formation The Yixian Formation (; formerly Romanization of Chinese, transcribed as Yihsien Formation or Yixiang Formation) is a geological formation in Jinzhou, Liaoning, People's Republic of China, that spans the Barremian stage of the Early Cretaceous. I ...

and lived during the

Early Cretaceous The Early Cretaceous (geochronology, geochronological name) or the Lower Cretaceous (chronostratigraphy, chronostratigraphic name) is the earlier or lower of the two major divisions of the Cretaceous. It is usually considered to stretch from 143.1 ...

period Period may refer to: Common uses * Period (punctuation) * Era, a length or span of time *Menstruation, commonly referred to as a "period" Arts, entertainment, and media * Period (music), a concept in musical composition * Periodic sentence (o ...

of what is today the

Liaoning Province ) , image_skyline = , image_alt = , image_caption = Clockwise: Mukden Palace in Shenyang, Xinghai Square in Dalian, Dalian coast, Yalu River at Dandong , image_map = Liaoning in China (+all claims hatched).svg , ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. The

type Type may refer to: Science and technology Computing * Typing, producing text via a keyboard, typewriter, etc. * Data type, collection of values used for computations. * File type * TYPE (DOS command), a command to display contents of a file. * ...

and only species is ''I. huchzermeyeri'', named in honor of the

archosaur Archosauria () or archosaurs () is a clade of diapsid sauropsid tetrapods, with birds and crocodilians being the only extant taxon, extant representatives. Although broadly classified as reptiles, which traditionally exclude birds, the cladistics ...

palaeontologist Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure geolo ...

Dr. Fritz Huchzermeyer, who died shortly before ''Iteravis'' was described.

Palaeobiology

''Iteravis'' ate larger particles of food than ''

Archaeorhynchus ''Archaeorhynchus'' (meaning "ancient snout") is a genus of beaked avialans from the early Cretaceous period. A fossil of its only known species, ''Archaeorhynchus spathula'', was first reported in 2005 by Zhou & Zhang to have been found in Yix ...

'', although the exact details of its diet remain enigmatic.

References

Euornithes Early Cretaceous dinosaurs of Asia Paleontology in Liaoning {{Paleo-bird-stub