Eucamerotus
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| Eucamerotus Fossil range: Lower Cretaceous |
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Eucamerotus (meaning "well-chambered" in reference to the hollows of the vertebrae) was a genus of sauropod dinosaur from the Barremian-age Lower Cretaceous Wessex Formation (Wealden) of the Isle of Wight, England. It is known from vertebral remains, and a partial skeleton has been referred, although this has not been accepted. It is one of several sauropods that is part of the complicated Ornithopsis-Pelorosaurus taxonomic tangle of fragmentary Late Jurassic-Early Cretaceous-age European sauropods.
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[edit] History and Taxonomy
John Hulke named the genus from several partial dorsal vertebrae: holotype BMNH R2522 (a neural arch), and paratypes BMNH R89 (two dorsals), BMNH R90 (two dorsal vertebrae), and BMNH R2524 (a dorsal from a juvenile).[1][2] He did not provide it with a species name, and within a few years thought that it was the same as Ornithopsis hulkei.[3] Other authors preferred Pelorosaurus as a synonym.[4][5][6]
William T. Blows resurrected the genus in 1995 as a valid brachiosaurid, added the species name foxi (originally spelled foxii), selected BMNH R2522 as the type specimen, and referred additional vertebrae and partial skeleton MIWG-BP001 to it.[7] This last point has not been generally accepted;[2][8] unfortunately, this skeleton has never been officially described. Naish and Martill (2001) suggested it was a dubious brachiosaurid, and did not find Blows' characters convincing.[2] Upchurch et al. (2004) considered it to be a dubious sauropod.[8] Santucci and Bertini (2005), however, suggested it was a titanosaurian.[9] Darren Naish, as of July 2006, considered it to be a brachiosaurid [1].
[edit] Paleobiology
If a brachiosaurid, Eucamerotus may have been around 15 m (49.2 ft) long,[2] small for a sauropod. As any kind of sauropod, it would have been a quadrupedal herbivore.[8]
[edit] References
- ^ Hulke, J.W. (1871). Appendix to a "note on a new and undescribed Weaden vertebra". Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 28:36-37.
- ^ a b c d Naish, D., and Martill, D.M. (2001). Saurischian dinosaurs 1: Sauropods. In: Martill, D.M., and Naish, D. (eds.). Dinosaurs of the Isle of Wight. The Palaeontological Association:London 185-241. ISBN 0-901707-72-2
- ^ Hulke, J.W. (1879). Note (3rd) on (Eucamerotus, Hulke) Ornithopsis, H. G. Seeley, = Bothriospondylus magnus Owen, = Chondrosteosaurus magnus, Owen. Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 35:752-762.
- ^ von Huene, F. (1909). Skizze zu einer Systematik und Stammesgeschichte der Dinosaurier. Centralblatt für Mineralogie, Geologie und Paläontologie 1909:12-22. [German]
- ^ Romer, A.S. (1956). Osteology of the Reptiles. University of Chicago Press:Chicago 1-772. ISBN 0-89464985-X
- ^ Steel, R. (1970). Part 14. Saurischia. Handbuch der Paläoherpetologie/Encyclopedia of Paleoherpetology. Part 14. Gustav Fischer Verlag:Stuttgart p. 1-87.
- ^ Blows, W.T. (1995). The Early Cretaceous brachiosaurid dinosaurs Ornithopsis and Eucamerotus from the Isle of Wight, England. Palaeontology 38(1):187-197.
- ^ a b c Upchurch, P.M., Barrett, P.M., and Dodson, P. (2004). Sauropoda. In: Weishampel, D.B., Dodson, P., and Osmólska, H. (eds.). The Dinosauria (2nd edition). University of California Press:Berkeley 259-322. ISBN 0-520-24209-2
- ^ Santucci, R.M., and Bertini, R.J. (2005). On the phylogenetic relationships of Eucamerotus foxi (Sauropoda, Saurischia), from Wessex Formation, Lower Cretaceous, England (UK). In: Kellner, A.W.A., Henriques, D.D.R., and Rodrigues, T. (eds.). II Congresso Latino-Americano de Paleontologia de Vertebrados, Boletim de Resumos. Museum Nacional/UFRJ:Rio de Janeiro, 242-243.
