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Maurissauro — Sanjuansaurus gordilloi

#argentina #dinosaur #dinosauria #fossil #herrerasaurus #mesozoic #skeleton #triassic #saurischia #herrerasauridae #carnian
Published: 2020-07-02 21:15:47 +0000 UTC; Views: 4354; Favourites: 53; Downloads: 0
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Description If you would like to use this skeleton as a reference, feel free to do it, just let me know and cite me if possible. If you want to use this skeleton or silhouette to something else, please ask for permission.

GENERAL INFO

Sanjuansaurus gordilloi was a large-sized (~3,5 meters) herrerasaurid and the first one described in recent years (Alcober & Martínez, 2010). 

It was collected on the Upper Triassic rocks of northwestern Argentina (San Juan). Sanjuansaurus comes from the lower portion of the Ischigualasto Formation, dated as ~231 Ma, Carnian stage of the Late Triassic.

Sanjuansaurus is known from its holotype specimen (PVSJ 605) and an additional specimen cited by Martínez et al (2013), which was neither figured in the literature nor described in detail. The holotype is a fairly complete specimen, lacking most of the skull and forelimbs, as well as part of the pelvic girdle and tail. Right fibula, calcaneum and astragalus are reversed here.

Known skeletal remains are depicted in white and unkown in gray. Gnathovorax  and  Herrerasaurus were used to reconstruct the proportions and missing elements of Sanjuansaurus' skeleton.

NOTES

The holotype specimen is badly preserved, and seems to have a kind of pathology in the distal portions of the right tibia and fibula, which is not depicted here. The teeth aren't proportionally as large as in some specimens of Herrerasaurus (e.g. PVSJ 407 and PVSJ 53). Cervical vertebrae have long and ventrally deflected transverse processes. Sanjuansaurus has the most craniocaudally short dorsal vertebrae that I've seen in herrerasaurids. I noted that the measurement of the tibia in the description paper is 10 cm lower than it should be, so I've assumed it as a typo, since in photographs of the specimen the scale indicates that the tibiae have at least 36 cm, instead of the 26 cm reported (which would make Sanjuansaurus extremely odd in its proportions). Nonetheless, the pubis is also ~10 cm shorter than it 'should' be, but this was confirmed by several sources, and since Gnathovorax also has short pubes, I left it this way.

CLASSIFICATION

Archosauria
    Dinosauromorpha
        Dinosauriformes
            Dinosauria
                Saurischia
                    Herrerasauridae
                        Sanjuansaurus gordilloi Alcober & Martínez, 2010


SOURCES
  • High-resolution photographs of specimen
  • Novas FE (1994) New information on the systematics and postcranial skeleton of Herrerasaurus ischigualastensis (Theropoda: Herrerasauridae). Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology 13: 400–423.
  • Alcober, Oscar A.; Martinez, Ricardo N. (2010) A new herrerasaurid (Dinosauria, Saurischia) from the Upper Triassic Ischigualasto Formation of northwestern Argentina. ZooKeys. 63: 55–81. doi:10.3897/zookeys.63.550
  • Pacheco, C.; Müller, R. T.; Langer, M. C.; Pretto, F.; Kerber, L.; Dias-da-Silva, S. (2019). Gnathovorax cabreirai: a new early dinosaur and the origin and initial radiation of predatory dinosaur. PeerJ, 7, e7963.
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DonnieandDougie [2021-12-05 05:22:59 +0000 UTC]

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