Tapuiasaurus
"Tapuia lizard"
- Lived
- 121 to 113 million years ago, Early Cretaceous
- Diet
- Herbivore
- Group
- Sauropods
- Found in
- Brazil
- Named by
- Zaher et al. 2011
Where its fossils were found
The evidence
Today
115 million years ago
Habitat
Its fossils come from lake deposits in Brazil. Spectrovenator lived in the same region, alongside fishes in the lakes.
Field notes
About Tapuiasaurus
What it was like
Tapuiasaurus was a titanosaur, a long-necked, four-legged plant eater. It is known from a nearly complete skull, one of the best titanosaur skulls ever found, with narrow, pencil-like teeth.
Its skull showed that titanosaur heads were more like those of Diplodocus than scientists had thought.
Its world
It lived in the Early Cretaceous in what is now southeastern Brazil. Its bones come from the Quiricó Formation, where it shared the land with the abelisaur Spectrovenator.
How it was found
Zaher and colleagues named Tapuiasaurus in 2011, from a single find.
Field gallery
More views of Tapuiasaurus
Scenes reconstructed from the available fossil evidence.
1 of 3
Lived alongside
Found in the same rock formations
A rock formation can hold fossils laid down millions of years apart, so not every animal here met Tapuiasaurus.
The evidence
The science behind Tapuiasaurus
Which parts of the picture come from its own bones, and which come from its relatives.
From its own fossils
- A nearly complete skull preserves long jaws and narrow, cylindrical teeth.
- The bony nostril openings sit far back on the skull, near the eye sockets.
- Wear marks occur on the outer faces of the upper teeth.
Borrowed from relatives
- Rapetosaurus and Nemegtosaurus provide comparisons for its long, narrow head.
- Missing parts of the body are restored by comparison with other titanosaurs.
Still unknown
- Its exact position in the titanosaur family tree.
- Its color and skin covering.
- Whether it cared for its young.
Discovery timeline
- 2011Named itZaher et al.
- 2016SkullWilson et al.
- 2020Same rocksZAHER et al.
Key papers
The research behind what we know of Tapuiasaurus
Named it
Named a titanosaur with a nearly complete skull, showing that long, narrow titanosaur heads had already evolved in the Early Cretaceous.
A Complete Skull of an Early Cretaceous Sauropod and the Evolution of Advanced Titanosaurians. PLoS ONE 6: e16663
Read the paper : A Complete Skull of an Early Cretaceous Sauropod and the Evolution of Advanced Titanosaurians (opens in a new tab)Skull
Detailed the skull after further preparation and scans, and found a more basal position in most of the resulting family trees.
The skull of the titanosaurTapuiasaurus macedoi(Dinosauria: Sauropoda), a basal titanosaur from the Lower Cretaceous of Brazil. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 178: 611-662
Read the paper : The skull of the titanosaurTapuiasaurus macedoi(Dinosauria: Sauropoda), a basal titanosaur from the Lower Cretaceous of Brazil (opens in a new tab)Same rocks
Described Spectrovenator, a meat eater from the same rocks whose skull shows an early stage of abelisaur evolution.
An Early Cretaceous theropod dinosaur from Brazil sheds light on the cranial evolution of the Abelisauridae. Comptes Rendus Palevol
Read the paper : An Early Cretaceous theropod dinosaur from Brazil sheds light on the cranial evolution of the Abelisauridae (opens in a new tab)
Close relatives
Other members of Saltasauroidea
Sources: Wikidata