A new saurolophine hadrosaurid (Dinosauria: Ornithopoda) from the Upper Cretaceous of South China, providing further support for the possible Asian origin of Brachylophosaurini

A new saurolophine hadrosaurid, Gongshuilong fanwei, is named and described here based on a series of largely disarticulated bone elements from the middle of the Upper Cretaceous Lianhe Formation in Ganzhou City, Jiangxi Province, South China. This taxon is diagnosed by a unique combination of traits, including an elevated anterodorsal process of the maxilla which is slightly longer than the anteroventral one, dentary tooth crowns ornamented with a median primary ridge and relatively small marginal denticles, an extremely truncated edentulous region of the dentary, an anteroposteriorly wide ventral process of the postorbital, a poorly developed deltoid ridge on the lateral surface of the scapula, and markedly elongate, posterodorsally directed neural spines of the posterior caudal vertebrae that are moderately recurved. Phylogenetic analysis yielded a polytomy at the base of Brachylophosaurini within Saurolophinae, which is formed by Wulagasaurus, Gongshuilong, Acristavus and the clade of Maiasaura + (Probrachylophosaurus + Brachylophosaurus). Gongshuilong is the first reported hadrosaurid genus from South China and is the second taxon of Brachylophosaurini found in Asia. Its discovery increases the possibility of the Asian origin for Saurolophinae and Brachylophosaurini, based on biogeographical analysis for ancestral areas using the Bayesian binary method. https://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:221FCD08-59F6-4637-9BC5-D50EB904EE2C