Ben Creisler
A new paper:
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Paulo Victor Luiz Gomes da Costa Pereira, Ingrid Martins Machado Garcia Veiga, Theo Baptista Ribeiro, Ryan Henrique Bezerra Cardozo, CarlosRoberto dos Anjos Candeiro Â& Lilian Paglarelli Bergqvist (2020)
The path of giants: a new occurrence of Rebbachisauridae (Dinosauria, Diplodocoidea) in The AÃu Formation, NE Brazil, and its paleobiogeographic implications.
Journal of South American Earth Sciences Article 102515 (advance online publication)
doi:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsames.2020.102515https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0895981120300286HIGHLIGHTS
A new occurrence of the clade Rebbachisauridae from the mid-Cretaceous of Brazil is described.
The remains show similar morphology to Rebbachisauridae ones, presenting closer affinities with Limaysaurus, Amazonsaurus and Demandasaurus, from Argentina, Brazil and Spain, respectively.
We comment on the paleobiogeographic implications of these similarities and on the worldwide occurrence of the group during this time span.
Abstract
The Rebbachisauridae (Diplodocoidea) comprises small to medium-sized sauropods that diversified at the end of the Early Cretaceousâbeginning of the Late Cretaceous in Africa, South America and Europe. The goal of this paper is to review the distribution of fossils assigned to Rebbachisauridae at Early-Late Cretaceous and describe the first occurence of this group in the AÃu Formation, Potiguar Basin, Brazil. The material consists of five isolated caudal vertebrae. The specimens have the combination of some characteristics shared with rebbachisaurid taxa, such as Limaysaurus, Amazonsaurus and Demandasaurus: (i) the anterior and posterior articular facets of the centrum are sub-hexagonal to sub-quadrangular; (ii) they bear a wide base; (iii) the centrum presents an amphicoelic condition; (iv) the centrum lacks pneumatization in both lateral and ventral surfaces; (v) an anterior position of the neural arch is implied by the anteriorly located centroneural suture of the centrum (Salgado et al., 1997; Wilson & Sereno, 1998; Canudo et al., 2018). The rebbachisaurids have been largely used for biogeographical interpretations due to its presence in both Gondwanan and Laurasian continents; the material presented here is a further evidence of this relationship once the specimens show similarities with both European and Argentinean forms. Furthermore, this occurrence enlarges the presence of the group in Brazil and South America, and is important for a better understanding of the faunistic context of the Northeast of South America and its relationship with other Early-Late Cretaceous faunas.