Episode 483: Hadrosaur holotypes and duck-billed diets. A brand new small African hadrosaur, Minqaria, was named; Mantellisaurus was redescribed and located to be a sound genus; Maiasaura had a excessive metabolism; and far more
Information:
- New lambeosaurine dinosaur from Morocco, Minqaria bata supply
- A brand new description of Mantellisaurus (together with a whole 3D scan of the 80% full holotype) confirms that it’s a distinctive genus supply
- Maiasaura was an energetic hadrosaur that grew shortly and used plenty of vitality supply
- Hadrosaurs have been so profitable as a result of they have been good at chewing supply
- Replace on Hypsibema/Parrosaurus missouriensis
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The dinosaur of the day: Titanoceratops
- Chasmosaurine ceratopsian that lived within the Late Cretaceous in what’s now New Mexico, U.S.
- Chasmosaurs are identified for his or her massive forehead horns and large frills. One of the vital well-known chasmosaurs is Triceratops
- Giant ceratopsian
- Appeared lots like Triceratops, walked on 4 legs, had a brief tail, had a big frill, two horns above its eyes and a nasal horn
- Being a ceratopsian, additionally had a beak (rostrum)
- One of many largest identified ceratopsids
- Estimated to be about 22.3 ft (6.8 m) lengthy
- Estimated to weigh 7.2 tons
- Gregory Paul estimated in 2016 it to be 21.3 ft (6.5 m) lengthy and weigh 4.9 tons
- Related in measurement to Triceratops
- A big Triceratops estimated to weigh about 7 tons, although there are bigger Triceratops (one estimated to weigh 7.8 tons)
- Cranium is incomplete, however is about 8.7 ft (2.65 m) lengthy
- Controversial genus
- Named in 2011 by Nicholas Longrich
- Kind and solely species is Titanoceratops ouranos
- Genus title means “titanic horned face”
- Genus title refers back to the Greek Titans, and the title refers back to the dinosaur’s massive measurement
- Species named after Uranus (Ouranos), the daddy of the Greek titans
- Named based mostly on a specimen initially regarded as Pentaceratops
- Holotype (OMNH 10165) is of a partial skeleton with a principally full cranium and jaws, together with a piece of the frill, and likewise vertebrae, ribs, components of the legs and arms, components of the pelvis, and ossified tendons
- Holotype discovered both within the higher Fruitland Formation or decrease Kirtland Formation (authentic website the place it was discovered has been misplaced)
- Haven’t been capable of finding the quarry the place it was discovered thus far, however do understand it comes from an space with fine-grained sediments with flecks of orange amber
- Fossils first present in 1941 in New Mexico by J. Willis Stovall, Wann Langston, Jr., and Donald E. Savage
- Fossils have been ready and mounted in 1995, and placed on show on the Oklahoma Museum of Pure Historical past (for a very long time wasn’t thought of appropriate to be mounted, as a result of bones have been crushed and fragile)
- Pentaceratops was frequent within the space the place it was discovered, so recognized as Pentaceratops (apparently reconstructed the frill to appear like Pentaceratops)
- In 1998, Thomas Lehman described the fossils as an unusually massive Pentaceratops (which had been present in the identical space)
- Longrich, nonetheless, discovered Titanoceratops to have extra shared options with Triceratops and Torosaurus than Pentaceratops
- In a weblog submit, Nick Longrich, who named Titanoceratops, stated that Pentaceratops was “extremely variable”, that means some specimens had sure options that others didn’t have, and that one very massive skeleton (OMNH 10165) appeared misplaced, particularly the cranium
- Stated it seemed extra like Triceratops, and that the components that did appear like Pentaceratops “the attribute ‘butterfly’ hornlets on the midline of the frill- weren’t actual bone. They have been simply sculpted out of plaster.”
- Longrich, within the paper naming Titanoceratops, recognized 22 characters that made the specimen completely different from Pentaceratops, together with its massive measurement (weighing over 11000 lb or 5000 kg), and a femur (thigh bone) that’s straight and vertically oriented
- Femur is just like elephants and sauropods, and would have helped help its weight
- One of many forehead horns is sort of 36 in (about 91 cm) lengthy
- Longrich stated it was unlikely that the massive specimen was so completely different due to particular person variation, as a result of its frill and horns have been “too excessive” and there are variations within the sinuses and nasals, which don’t normally have particular person variation
- Additionally stated that its distinguishing options weren’t associated to its massive physique measurement, as there are ceratopsids about the identical measurement with related derived options, just like the forehead horns coming from behind the eyes, and having actually lengthy, strongly curved horns
- Along with being a lot larger, and possibly weighing over twice as a lot as a typical Pentaceratops, had massive, ahead curving forehead horns that have been extra like Triceratops than Pentaceratops, and had a nasal horn on the entrance of the nostrils, additionally like Triceratops
- Extra particulars too, together with the sides of the frill trying extra like Torosaurus or Triceratops frills (not as rodlike as different Pentaceratops specimens)
- And Longrich stated that ontogeny (development) didn’t clarify the variations as a result of the specimen has options that point out its a mature grownup, akin to fusions within the bones and a tough texture on its cranium, and different Pentaceratops specimens are additionally adults however nonetheless look completely different
- Longrich wrote: “The best clarification that matches the information is that OMNH 10165 is what it seems to be: a large ceratopsid associated to Triceratops”
- Stated it might be useful to seek out extra fossils, particularly an intact frill, to know for certain
- Longrich additionally discovered that Titanoceratops is a sister taxon of a clade that features Eotriceratops, Triceratops, and Torosaurus (named Triceratopsini)
- In comparison with Triceratops, Titanoceratops had an extended, thinner frill, an extended snout, and its forehead horns have been a bit larger
- Titanoceratops lived about eight million years sooner than Triceratops, (estimated to have lived about 74 mya)
- Longrich recommended Titanoceratops may even be a direct ancestor to Triceratops
- Not everybody agrees with Titanoceratops being its personal genus. Some paleontologists argue it’s a extremely massive Pentaceratops
- Thomas Lehman didn’t point out Longrich’s Titanoceratops in a later 2015 research on OMNH 10165 (nonetheless referred to as it Pentaceratops)
- In 2020, Denver Fowler and Elizabeth Freedman Fowler discovered that Titanoceratops was Pentaceratops, and that the specimen appeared distinctive as a result of it was very outdated and really massive
- Lived in a moist, well-forested space
- Different dinosaurs that lived across the similar time and place embrace the tyrannosauroid Bistahieversor, the troodontid “Saurornitholestes” robustus,” the doubtful theropod Paronychodon, an indeterminate ornithomimid, hadrosaurids Anasazisaurus and Parasaurolophus, the pachycephalosaur Stegoceras, and the ankylosaur Nodocephalosaurus
- Additionally the ceratopsian Pentaceratops, if Titanoceratops is legitimate
- Different animals that lived across the similar time and place embrace fish, turtles, crocodilians, mammals
Enjoyable Truth:
There aren’t any identified dinosaurs that shrink as they develop up, however there’s at the least one animal that does shrink because it grows up—the “paradoxical frog” or “shrinking frog”.
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