“It’s something that truly takes the cake for wonderful cranial adaptations in this group, the prolonged-necked dinosaurs,” claims Sereno, a professor of paleontology with the University of Chicago. “It’s just a majestic example of evolution.”
Nigersaurus is usually a thirty-foot-very long plant-taking in dinosaur that lived a hundred and ten million several years in the past in what is currently Niger’s Sahara Desert. Nigersaurus lived within a lush environment together with the predatory dinosaur Suchomimus, the plant eaters ouranosaurus and lurdusaurus, and supercroc. Nigersaurus had a fragile cranium and an extremely broad mouth lined with teeth especially adapted for browsing crops near to the bottom.
Only by bringing collectively crops from around the world and a variety of contemporary environments can a dinosaur-age scene be recreated. A few of the plants, like ginkgos, search almost the same as their extinct ancestors; some, just like the conifer Araucaria, were the dominant trees on the forests one hundred ten million years ago.
Nigersaurus is a crucial discovery for paleontologists since it helps you to get rid of gentle about the evolution and variety of sauropods in the mid-Cretaceous interval.
eight ft) in size and weighing about 2 tons. In spite of its small measurement when compared with other sauropods, it gained consideration on account of its special anatomy, including a broad muzzle resembling a vacuum cleaner and dental batteries consisting of a huge selection of smaller, needle-shaped teeth organized in columns.
‘ cranium was greater and Found farther previously mentioned the muzzle as compared to other sauropods. This means that its Visible fields overlapped, resulting in a in the vicinity of 360-diploma area of perspective (very like modern day cows).
This means that as one tooth wore down or broke off, A further was willing to choose its spot. This swift tooth substitute cycle, happening somewhere around each and every fourteen times, ensured that Nigersaurus usually had purposeful teeth to method its food stuff.
Its cranium was pretty specialised for feeding. It experienced 4 substantial facet fenestrae, openings within the skull and thin bones. It experienced a large muzzle filled with more than 500 teeth, which had been replaced around every 14 days. The jaws could have experienced a keratinous sheath, anything just like a huge beak. Nigersaurus is the one regarded tetrapod animal to obtain experienced jaws broader when compared to the cranium and teeth that prolonged laterally over the front.
Head's Up! (Possibly) Since Nigersaurus ate with its head down, professionals have wondered about its posture. Sereno and his co-authors the moment argued the herbivore aimed its encounter and neck downwards — whether it absolutely was feeding or not — for a issue of pattern.
Such as, its fossils recommend that it experienced a broad, deep ribcage that may have allowed it to absorb big amounts of air, facilitating its respiratory and supplying the oxygen it required to maintain its huge overall body.
Improved however, People tooth columns had been packed suitable along with one another—like canned sardines. So a dinosaur armed with dental batteries could easily house Nigersaurus many hundred teeth (old and new) inside of its mouth.
The snout was also proportionately shorter, along with the tooth row was in no way prognathous, the snout suggestion not protruding relative to the rest with the tooth collection.[one] Nigersaurus was distinctive in that its frontal bone (which shaped Substantially with the cranium-roof) was elongate (Substantially narrower than extensive), and experienced a marked cerebral fossa (a despair to the floor of this bone Within the head).[4] The maxillary tooth row was in its entirety transversely rotated, its normal rear 90° everted towards the entrance. This was matched by A similar rotation with the dentary with the decreased jaw. This transverse orientation with the upper and reduce tooth rows was distinctive towards the dinosaur. Because of this configuration, no other tetrapod experienced all of its teeth Found as much towards the front as Nigersaurus.[3][four]
‘ humorous-looking cranium, battery of teeth, and small sizing for your sauropod have undoubtedly won it an area within the annals of dinosaur oddities.
These jaws held something never before seen inside of a sauropod dinosaur: It absolutely was on the list of initial dinosaur skulls with tooth, or "dental," batteries.