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      Structural Extremes in a Cretaceous Dinosaur

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          Abstract

          Fossils of the Early Cretaceous dinosaur, Nigersaurus taqueti, document for the first time the cranial anatomy of a rebbachisaurid sauropod. Its extreme adaptations for herbivory at ground-level challenge current hypotheses regarding feeding function and feeding strategy among diplodocoids, the larger clade of sauropods that includes Nigersaurus. We used high resolution computed tomography, stereolithography, and standard molding and casting techniques to reassemble the extremely fragile skull. Computed tomography also allowed us to render the first endocast for a sauropod preserving portions of the olfactory bulbs, cerebrum and inner ear, the latter permitting us to establish habitual head posture. To elucidate evidence of tooth wear and tooth replacement rate, we used photographic-casting techniques and crown thin sections, respectively. To reconstruct its 9-meter postcranial skeleton, we combined and size-adjusted multiple partial skeletons. Finally, we used maximum parsimony algorithms on character data to obtain the best estimate of phylogenetic relationships among diplodocoid sauropods. Nigersaurus taqueti shows extreme adaptations for a dinosaurian herbivore including a skull of extremely light construction, tooth batteries located at the distal end of the jaws, tooth replacement as fast as one per month, an expanded muzzle that faces directly toward the ground, and hollow presacral vertebral centra with more air sac space than bone by volume. A cranial endocast provides the first reasonably complete view of a sauropod brain including its small olfactory bulbs and cerebrum. Skeletal and dental evidence suggests that Nigersaurus was a ground-level herbivore that gathered and sliced relatively soft vegetation, the culmination of a low-browsing feeding strategy first established among diplodocoids during the Jurassic.

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          Most cited references57

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          Sauropod dinosaur phylogeny: critique and cladistic analysis

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            Dinosaur coprolites and the early evolution of grasses and grazers.

            Silicified plant tissues (phytoliths) preserved in Late Cretaceous coprolites from India show that at least five taxa from extant grass (Poaceae) subclades were present on the Indian subcontinent during the latest Cretaceous. This taxonomic diversity suggests that crown-group Poaceae had diversified and spread in Gondwana before India became geographically isolated. Other phytoliths extracted from the coprolites (from dicotyledons, conifers, and palms) suggest that the suspected dung producers (titanosaur sauropods) fed indiscriminately on a wide range of plants. These data also make plausible the hypothesis that gondwanatherian mammals with hypsodont cheek teeth were grazers.
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              Neuroanatomy of flying reptiles and implications for flight, posture and behaviour.

              Comparison of birds and pterosaurs, the two archosaurian flyers, sheds light on adaptation to an aerial lifestyle. The neurological basis of control holds particular interest in that flight demands on sensory integration, equilibrium, and muscular coordination are acute. Here we compare the brain and vestibular apparatus in two pterosaurs based on high-resolution computed tomographic (CT) scans from which we constructed digital endocasts. Although general neural organization resembles birds, pterosaurs had smaller brains relative to body mass than do birds. This difference probably has more to do with phylogeny than flight, in that birds evolved from nonavian theropods that had already established trends for greater encephalization. Orientation of the osseous labyrinth relative to the long axis of the skull was different in these two pterosaur species, suggesting very different head postures and reflecting differing behaviours. Their enlarged semicircular canals reflect a highly refined organ of equilibrium, which is concordant with pterosaurs being visually based, aerial predators. Their enormous cerebellar floccular lobes may suggest neural integration of extensive sensory information from the wing, further enhancing eye- and neck-based reflex mechanisms for stabilizing gaze.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Role: Academic Editor
                Journal
                PLoS ONE
                plos
                plosone
                PLoS ONE
                Public Library of Science (San Francisco, USA )
                1932-6203
                2007
                21 November 2007
                : 2
                : 11
                : e1230
                Affiliations
                [1 ]Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America
                [2 ]Museum of Paleontology and Department of Geological Sciences, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States of America
                [3 ]Department of Biomedical Sciences, College of Osteopathic Medicine, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, United States of America
                [4 ]Institute for Human Science, University of Niamey, Niamey, Republic of Niger
                [5 ]Jackson School of Geological Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America
                University of Oxford, United Kingdom
                Author notes
                * To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: dinosaur@ 123456uchicago.edu

                Involved in writing sections of the paper: PCS JAW-1 LMW JAW-2. Participants in discovering the fossil material: PCS JAW-1 AM OI. Involved in interpreting the fossil material: PCS JAW-1. Involved in CT-scanning, rendering from scans, and interpreting fossil material that was scanned: PCS LMW TAR. Conducted the microwear analysis: JAW-2. Conducted the phylogenetic analysis: JAW-1 JAW-2.

                Article
                07-PONE-RA-02654R1
                10.1371/journal.pone.0001230
                2077925
                18030355
                c09563b5-9ca0-48a0-a59c-27e4b7c8d70f
                Sereno et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
                History
                : 2 November 2007
                : 7 November 2007
                Page count
                Pages: 9
                Categories
                Research Article
                Evolutionary Biology
                Science Policy
                Evolutionary Biology/Paleontology
                Radiology and Medical Imaging/Computer Tomography

                Uncategorized
                Uncategorized

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