Category: Publications

We describe a giant titanosaurid sauropod dinosaur discovered in coastal deposits in the Upper Cretaceous Bahariya Formation of Egypt, a unit that has produced threeTyrannosaurus-sized theropods and numerous other vertebrate taxa. Paralititan stromeri is the first tetrapod reported from Bahariya since 1935. Its 1.69-meter-long humerus is longer than that of any known Cretaceous sauropod. The…

Three-dimensional specimens of the volant fossil bird Gansus yumenensis from the Early Cretaceous Xiagou Formation of northwestern China demonstrate that this taxon possesses advanced anatomical features previously known only in Late Cretaceous and Cenozoic ornithuran birds. Phylogenetic analysis recovers Gansus within the Ornithurae, making it the oldest known member of the clade. The Xiagou Formation…

We herein describe an associated partial postcranial skeleton of a theropod dinosaur discovered in the Lower Cretaceous Xinminpu Group of the Yujingzi Basin, in the Jiuquan area of Gansu Province, northwestern China. Features of its humerus, such as strongly expanded proximal and distal ends, a well developed medial tuberosity, distal condyles expressed on the humeral…

Titanosaurian sauropod dinosaurs were the most diverse and abundant large-bodied herbivores in the southern continents during the final 30 million years of the Mesozoic Era. Several titanosaur species are regarded as the most massive land-living animals yet discovered; nevertheless, nearly all of these giant titanosaurs are known only from very incomplete fossils, hindering a detailed…