Nigersaurus experienced a amazing dental battery consisting of close to five hundred narrow, closely packed teeth, arranged in rows alongside its extensive, flat jaw.
are grouped within the subfamily Nigersaurinae in the family members Rebbachisauridae, that is Portion of the sauropod superfamily Diplodocoidea. Nigersaurus
This Nigersaurus was a hatchling, in all probability fewer than one calendar year from hatching when it died and was fossilized.”
“Here is the first sauropod using a tooth battery,” Sereno states, introducing that its jaw might have been angled downwards in lieu of forwards — which is why Sereno had this sort of issues fitting the bones alongside one another initially.
There's been discussion on regardless of whether its head was habitually held downwards, or horizontally like other sauropods. It lived inside a riparian habitat, and its diet possibly consisted of sentimental plants, which include ferns, horsetails, and angiosperms. It can be Just about the most typical fossil vertebrates uncovered in the area, and shared its habitat with other dinosaurian megaherbivores, along with big theropods and crocodylomorphs.
Nigersaurus is placed within the classification of sauropods through which many of the prolonged-necked and long-tailed dinosaurs are positioned. Nigersaurus was probably one of several smallest sauropods for the reason that its neck was quick. An Grownup Nigersaurus weighed all over 4 tons and its dimension was akin to a contemporary Elephant.
As we continue to check this intriguing creature, we're reminded from the intricate and assorted paths that evolution normally takes.
Its cranium was pretty specialised for feeding. It experienced 4 substantial side fenestrae, openings inside the skull and thin bones. It had a wide muzzle filled with more than 500 teeth, which ended up changed all around every single 14 days. The jaws might have had a keratinous sheath, one thing just like a broad beak. Nigersaurus is the one 500 teeth dinosaur regarded tetrapod animal to own experienced jaws broader as opposed to cranium and teeth that extended laterally through the entrance.
Putting collectively these odd anatomical aspects, Nigersaurus appears to are very well tailored to minimal searching; most certainly it swept its neck back and forth parallel to the bottom, hoovering up any vegetation in just quick reach. (Other sauropods, which experienced much longer necks, might have nibbled to the high branches of trees, even though even this stays a subject of some dispute.)
The jaws could have borne a keratinous sheath. As opposed to other tetrapods, the tooth-bearing bones of its jaws were rotated transversely relative to the remainder of the skull, so that all of its teeth ended up located significantly on the front. Its skeleton was really pneumatised (full of air spaces linked to air sacs), however the limbs ended up robustly developed.
A 2023 analyze from the French palaeontologist Rémi Lefebvre and colleagues examined the microanatomical structure on the limb bones of Nigersaurus as a result of CT-scans, the very first these analyze of a sauropod. Virtual sections of the limb bones sampled from people today of different dimensions had been explored to find out the number of variation. Heavy-bodyweight bearing animals generally have features related to this issue, influencing the inner composition of the limb bones, nevertheless the variation amongst this sort of bones is poorly regarded.
Like other sauropods, Nigersaurus had a protracted neck and tail. However, its neck was reasonably shorter compared to other associates of its team, aligning with its low-grazing Life-style. Its columnar legs supported its quadrupedal posture and aided bear its weight efficiently.
These teeth were specialized for successfully cropping and grinding tender, small-lying vegetation. The dinosaur’s teeth were being continuously replaced, with new types developing every single 14 days to keep up operation.
Skeletal diagram of Nigersaurus taqueti, illustrating recognised fossil things and dimensions comparison using a human, depicting this Cretaceous sauropod's one of a kind Actual physical construction