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''Xianglong'' (meaning "flying dragon" in Chinese) is a genus of Cretaceous lizard discovered in the Zhuanchengzi, near Yizhou, Yixian, Liaoning Province of China.〔(Ancient Lizard Glided on Stretched Ribs ) Ker Than, Fox News Published March 21, 2007〕 It is known from LPM 000666, a single complete skeleton with skin impressions. The specimen comes from the Barremian-age Lower Cretaceous Yixian Formation, near Yizhou. The most notable feature about ''Xianglong'' is its bizarre oversized ribs, eight on each side, which were attached to a membrane of body tissue and allowed the lizard to glide. It was an acrodont lizard, and a cladistic analysis indicates it was grouped with iguanians such as agamines, chamaeleonids, and leiolepidines. The fossil specimen found was long, of which was tail, but the describers say it was a juvenile. So far this is the only known fossil gliding lizard, though there are other unrelated animals that also use their ribs to glide.〔 ==Gliding ability== Xianglong is one of the few creatures that glide using their ribs. Other creatures, such as the flying squirrel and the Malabar Flying Frog, ''Rhacophorus malabaricus'', have a different membrane attachment, toes to toes or limb to limb. Two creatures use the same way to glide, the present day Flying Lizard (genus ''Draco'', Latin for dragon) and Triassic fossil reptiles such as ''Kuehneosaurus'', but the Triassic look-alikes lived over 100 million years before ''Xianglong''. Despite the "rib-span", the lizard might have been quite agile in the air, possibly to escape the feathered dinosaurs that coexisted with it. ''Xianglong'' had slightly curved claws, indicating that it was arboreal. Of course, it needed to be in order to get in its "gliding mode". Xu Xing, a Chinese paleontologist and one of the describers of ''Xianglong'', states that it is possible ''Xianlong'' could have glided as much as half a football field, much farther than that of the modern ''Draco''. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Xianglong」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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