Producción CyT
Artículo
Autoría
Paul Barrett
;
Phillip Mannion
;
Samantha Beeston
;
MATTHEW C. LAMANNA
;
Brett Clarck
;
OTERO, ALEJANDRO
;
Jose O'Gorman
;
Mark evans
Fecha
2026
Editorial y Lugar de Edición
INST PALEOBIOLOGII PAN
Revista
ACTA PALAEONTOLOGICA POLONICA
INST PALEOBIOLOGII PAN
Resumen
Información suministrada por el agente en
SIGEVA
Antarctica preserves a meagre Mesozoic dinosaur record, with fossils known only from the Lower Jurassic Hanson Formation of the Transantarctic Mountains and Upper Cretaceous units of the James Ross Sub-Basin of the Antarctic Peninsula. Late Cretaceous assemblages include ankylosaurs, ornithopods, and non-avian and avian theropods, but sauropods are exceptionally rare. Here, we describe a titanosaurian caudal vertebra from an lower Campanian (Upper Cretaceous (lower Campanian) horizon of the San...
Antarctica preserves a meagre Mesozoic dinosaur record, with fossils known only from the Lower Jurassic Hanson Formation of the Transantarctic Mountains and Upper Cretaceous units of the James Ross Sub-Basin of the Antarctic Peninsula. Late Cretaceous assemblages include ankylosaurs, ornithopods, and non-avian and avian theropods, but sauropods are exceptionally rare. Here, we describe a titanosaurian caudal vertebra from an lower Campanian (Upper Cretaceous (lower Campanian) horizon of the Santa Marta Formation of James Ross Island and discuss its implications for the evolutionary and palaeobiogeographic history of Antarctic sauropods. The specimen is a small, procoelous anterior caudal vertebra, identified as that of a non-saltasaurid eutitanosaurian. Its morphology closely corresponds to that of rinconsaurians, particularly the Late Cretaceous Argentinean species Muyelensaurus pecheni, and it differs from aeolosaurines and earlier-diverging titanosaurs, although its fragmentary preservation warrants a conservative taxonomic assignment. Size comparisons indicate that the individual in question was small for a titanosaur, possibly reflecting immaturity or a genuinely small-bodied form. This discovery represents only the second sauropod body fossil known from Antarctica, although it was the first dinosaur bone to be collected from the continent. Coupled with the occurrence of diamantinasaurians in Patagonia and Australia during the mid-Cretaceous, its eutitanosaurian affinities imply the presence of multiple somphospondylan lineages in Antarctica, informing dispersal patterns and highlighting biogeographic links with other Gondwanan landmasses.
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Palabras Clave
DINOSAURIASAUROPODAANTARCTICABIOGEOGRAPHY