Re: Argentine sauropod embryos

[Jeff Hecht <jeff.hecht@sff.net>]

At 4:17 PM -0400 9/27/01, Thomas R. Holtz, Jr. wrote:
> Chiappe, L.M., L. Salgado & R.A. Coria.  2001.  Embryonic skulls of
> titanosaur sauropod dinosaurs.  Science 293: 2444-2446.
>
> Examines the nice little skulls of the titanosaur embryos from Auca Mahuevo.
> They show the same notch between the maxilla and the jugal & quadratojugal
> found in _Rapetosaurus_.  Interestingly the external nares seem to be
> anterior to the orbits (weird in a sauropod!), but they suggest that these
> might migrate backwards during ontogeny.

New Scientist should have my story on this up on their web site 
tomorrow (I don't know why it didn't get up today).

Interestingly, the skulls are the best-preserved part of the embryos, 
and are nicely articulated, although a bit distorted. Luis Chiappe 
told me that no skulls that complete and articulated are known for 
titanosaurs -- and added that it's quite odd that something as rare 
as fossil embryos provided the missing pieces for titanosaurs.

> The taxon remains unnamed, possibly because there is mention of a nearly
> complete skeleton from the same formation waiting to be described (and
> perhaps the same species, as it shares some cranial synapomorphies with the
> little guys).

That's what they suspect. The big guys were about 15-20 meters long. 
The embryos were all of 30 centimeters long from the head to tip of 
tail.

Neat stuff and very good work.
--
Jeff Hecht science & technology writer
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