Stegosaurus from Portugal

[Francisco Ortega <frco.ortega@gmail.com>]

We already have Stegosaurus in the Iberian Peninsula! (or, at least,
that is what we believe).

New paper:

Escaso, F; Ortega, F.; Dantas, P.; Malafaia, E.; Pimentel, N.L;
Pereda-Suberbiola, X.; Sanz, J.L.; Kullberg, J.C.; Kullberg, M.C.;
Barriga, F. (now online, in paper 2007)
New Evidence of Shared Dinosaur Across Upper Jurassic Proto-North
Atlantic: Stegosaurus From Portugal. Naturwissenschaften

Abstract: More than one century after its original description by
Marsh in 1877, we report in this paper the first uncontroversial
evidence of a member of the genus Stegosaurus out of North America.
The specimen consists of a partial skeleton from the Upper Jurassic of
Portugal herein considered as Stegosaurus cf. ungulatus. The presence
of this plated dinosaur in both, the upper Kimmeridgian-lower
Tithonian Portuguese record, and synchronic levels of the Morrison
Formation of North America, reinforces previous hypothesis of a close
relationship between these two areas during the Late Jurassic. This
relationship is also supported by geotectonic evidences indicating
high probability of an episodic corridor between Newfoundland and
Iberian landmasses. Together, Portuguese Stegosaurus discovery and
geotectonic inferences could provide a scenario with episodical faunal
contact among North-Atlantic landmasses during the uppermost
Kimmeridgian- lowermost Tithonian (ca. 148-153 Ma ago).

the Online First version is at
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00114-006-0209-8


--
Francisco Ortega
Fac. de Ciencias. Biologia-DFMF
Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia
c/ Senda del Rey nº9.
28040. Madrid
phone (+34)  91 398 9341
http://www.dfmf.uned.es/~fortega/