{"id":272490,"date":"2025-06-04T10:10:44","date_gmt":"2025-06-04T10:10:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/uncategorized\/well-preserved-dinosaur-skull-belongs-to-new-sauropod-species\/"},"modified":"2025-06-04T10:10:44","modified_gmt":"2025-06-04T10:10:44","slug":"well-preserved-dinosaur-skull-belongs-to-new-sauropod-species","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=272490","title":{"rendered":"Well-preserved dinosaur skull belongs to new sauropod species"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Sauropods were some of the largest dinosaurs<\/a> to ever stomp across the planet, and they did their stomping pretty much everywhere. But while paleontologists<\/a> have discovered fossils from species like Apatosaurus<\/em> and Brachiosaurus <\/em>on almost every present-day continent, those found in China have been largely relegated to the nation\u2019s southern and western regions.\u00a0 Well-preserved remains of non-neosauropod eusauropods are even more rare. These relatives existed through the Middle Jurassic approximately 174 to 161 million years ago.<\/p>\n

According to a recent study published in Scientific Reports<\/em><\/a>, a team led by researchers at the China University of Geosciences has discovered a new sauropod species they call Jinchuanloong niedu<\/em>. And their specimen\u2019s skull is one of the most well-preserved ever excavated.<\/p>\n

\"Caudal
The caudal vertebrae of Jinchuanloong niedu in northwestern China. Credit: Scientific Reports<\/em> <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Almost all giant, long-necked dinosaurs beyond their earliest evolutionary forms belong to the eusauropod clade. They eventually became the only sauropod line to survive past the Early Jurassic\u2019s global mass extinction event<\/a>, with many species evolving to make up the neosauropoda clade.This later clade includes Brachiosaurus<\/em> and Apatosaurus<\/em>. While these newer neosauropods were the majority, some non-neosauropod continued to exist through the Middle Jurassic. But of those, paleontologists have recovered very few with well-preserved skulls, leaving large gaps in the overall fossil record. Jinchuanloong niedu<\/em>, however, is helping to fill in those missing pieces.<\/p>\n

The remains discovered at the Xinhe Formation located in northwestern China encompass five articulated cervical vertebrae, 29 articulated caudal vertebrae, along with a nearly complete skull that includes its mandible. The fossil trove\u2019s location in the sedimentary layers indicate the dinosaur lived sometime around the Middle Jurassic\u2019s late Bathonion period\u2013roughly 165 to 186 million years ago.<\/p>\n

After comparing their specimen with other East Asian sauropods, the university\u2019s announcement<\/a> noted a mix of \u201cprimitive and derived features\u201d that pointed to a unique, previously undiscovered species.
Despite its preservation, the first known Jinchuanloong niedu <\/em>specimen doesn\u2019t appear to be an adult. Physiological features including unfused neural arches in the caudal vertebrae imply that the dinosaur was a juvenile or subadult when it died. But given that it was already nearly 100 feet long, it\u2019s a near-certainty that Jinchuanloong niedu<\/em> still grew to colossal proportions.<\/p>\n

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