bcreisler@gmailc.om
First, a note of gratitude to Justin Tweet for changing the font and color scheme for his Equatorial Minnesota website. This is a very important and useful blog, but the white text on a black background could createÂa kind of "zebra stripe" effect for me when I wasÂreading long passages of text online. MuchÂeasier to read online with the new look... (I don't feel like a confused stalking lion...)
(However, there are some other paleo websites that use low contrast gray text on a blackÂbackground or other combinations that may look "cool" but may be harder to read depending on the viewing device or other issues. My solution remains to "print" to pdf in Chrome to read on a white background.)Â
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The full paper is not yet posted, but the abstract is now online:
VerÃnica DÃez DÃaz, Oliver E. Demuth, Daniela Schwarz and Heinrich Mallison (2020)
The Tail of the Late Jurassic Sauropod Giraffatitan brancai: Digital Reconstruction of its Epaxial and Hypaxial Musculature, and Implications for Tail Biomechanics.
Frontiers in Earth Science (abstract only)
doi: 10.3389/feart.2020.00160
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2020.00160/abstract
Dinosaur locomotion and biomechanics, especially of their pelvic girdles and hind limbs, have been analysed in numerous studies. However, detailed volumetric musculoskeletal models of their tails are rarely developed. Here, we present the first detailed three-dimensional volumetric reconstruction of the caudal epaxial and hypaxial musculature of the Late Jurassic sauropod Giraffatitan brancai, and highlight the importance and necessity of 3D modelling in musculoskeletal reconstructions. The tail of this basal macronarian is relatively short compared to diplodocids and other coexisting macronarians. The centre of mass lies well in front of the hind limbs, which support only ca. half the body weight. Still, our reconstruction suggests a total weight for the entire tail of ca. 2500 kg. We conclude that the hypaxial and hind limb muscles (more specifically the M. caudofemoralis longus and its counterpart the M. ilioischiocaudalis) in Giraffatitan were well developed and robustly built, compensating for the shorter length of the M. caufodemoralis longus, the main hind limb retractor muscle, in comparison with other sauropods.
Our methodology allows a better-constrained reconstruction of muscle volumes and masses, in extinct taxa, and thus force and weight distributions, throughout the tail, than non-volumetric approaches.
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Spinosaurus Revolution - Extended Edition: All Hail to the Triton Dinosaur! (in Italian)
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Cristiano Dal Sasso and new Spinosaurus research (in Italian)
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University of Louisville professor helps identify 66 million-year-old 'crazy beast' Adalatherium Âfossil from Madagascar
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Modern cochlea, primitive teeth (in German)
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Fossils displayed at Dinosaur National Geopark in Henan (photo gallery)
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What did an ideal scene from the Hell Creek Fm. ecosystem look like by Czech paleoartist Petr Modlitba (in Czech)