Mansourasaurus shahinae (meaning "Mansoura Lizard") is a herbivorous lithostrotian sauropod genus from the Quseir group in Egypt. The type and unique species is Mansourasaurus shahinae.
Paleontologists believe that the discovery of Mansourasaurus is very important because the Late Cretaceous sauropod dinosaurs found in Africa are few, and the rock formations that are stored elsewhere and produce fossil beds are often undiscovered and exposed to the ground or nearby.
Discovery and naming[]
Hesham Sallam, a paleontologist at Mansoura University, and a group of students discovered a sauropod dinosaur skeleton in the Dakhla Oasis in the western desert of Egypt. According to reports, more than 30 dinosaur specimens were excavated in 2016, including titanosaurs.
Based on this skeleton, the species Mansourasaurus shahinae was in January 2018 by Hesham M. Sallam, Eri c Gorscak, Patrick M. O'Connor, Iman A. El-Dawoudi, Sanaa El-Sayed, Sara Saber, Mahmoud and description name. . A. Kora, Joseph JW Sertich, Erik R. Seiffert and Matthew C. Lamanna. The generic name refers to the University of Mansoura. The specific name is Mona Sahin, co-founder of the Department of Vertebrate Paleontology at the University of Mansoura.
The Mansourasaurus specimen described in 2018 is its full-size, MUVP 200, found on the first floor of the Quacir formation, dating back to the late Campanian, about 73 million years. It consists of a part of the bone with a skull and jaw. It contains fragments of the top of the skull, a part of the lower meninges, teeth of the lower jaw, three cervical vertebrae, two posterior vertebrae, eight ribs, a right scapula, a right tibia, two humerus, one radius, three metacarpals, three A tibia and part of osteoporosis. The skeleton was found on a surface of four to three meters. It is not clearly expressed. The authors conclude that this holographic type is a juvenile specimen because the bones of its shoulder strap have not yet merged. The ulnar specimen MUVP 201 found at 20 meters of bone is not mentioned as a species because it appears to be a bit too large for a complete type of individual and does not prove a general connection to the species.
Description[]
Individuals that are not fully planted are about 8-10 meters (26-33 feet) long. It may weigh about 5,000 kilograms, roughly the same as the bull African elephant.
The author of this description points out a number of distinguishing features. These are autapomorphies, unique derived characters. There are ten teeth in each jaw. In the case where the jaws are in contact with each other, at the front of the lower jaw, they have a common "chin" equal to one third of the height of the front. In the horizontal groove on the inside, the Meckeliana nest is mostly open downwards. The anterior cervical spine is pierced by the posterior hole. In at least one anterior cervical vertebra, the facet joint of the lower limb fracture has a horizontal length equal to the center of the entire vertebra. For some anterior cervical vertebrae, the bone mesh between the heads of the neck ribs is pierced by the holes. The lateral width at the lower end of the radius is four times the width measured from front to back.
Phylogeny[]
Mansourasaurus was placed in the Titanosauria in a derived position as a sister species Lohuecotitan.
Gallery[]
Mansourasaurus/Gallery