A 2009 study from the British palaeontologist Mike P. Taylor and colleagues agreed that Nigersaurus was capable of feed with the downturned head and neck posture proposed via the 2007 research, but contested this was the habitual posture on the animal. The research mentioned which the "neutral" head and neck posture of recent animals would not necessarily correspond for their habitual head posture.
As we go on to check this intriguing creature, we're reminded from the intricate and varied paths that evolution usually takes.
All the tooth columns in Nigersaurus' dental batteries were being lined up, compared with the teeth of other dinosaurs, for the quite front of its mouth, positioned together the muzzle's gently curved outer edge.
It can be believed that these sauropod dinosaurs gathered food items employing their big, wide mouths, much like grazing in modern day cows. They might probable have already been “nonselective” in their diet regime. two. Nigersaurus was one of several first dinosaurs to acquire a CT scan
Named after the nation of Niger, exactly where its fossils were first found. The identify was decided on to mirror its origins, nevertheless, the similarity in pronunciation to a racial slur has raised concerns about cultural sensitivity and correct terminology.
In 2020, the French palaeontologist Julien Benoit and colleagues examined lateral semicircular canal correlation to head posture on contemporary mammals, and located that when there was important correlation among the reconstructed and true head postures, the plane of the semicircular canal was not held horizontally during the resting pose as inferred.
Because several rebbachisaurids inhabited latitudes that could have been tropical to subtropical in the center Cretaceous, this pneumaticity may have aided the animals cope With all the incredibly higher temperatures. As outlined by Ibiricu and colleagues, this adaptation may be a purpose why rebbachisaurids ended up the only group of diplodocoids that survived into your Late Cretaceous.[21]
Total, Nigersaurus was a unique and strange dinosaur as a consequence of its dental batteries and broad muzzle, which authorized it to effectively course of action and Assemble plant content. Its small measurement and herbivorous eating plan enable it to be a fascinating distinction for the larger, carnivorous dinosaurs that happen to be a lot more usually identified to the general public.
When the primary fossils of Nigersaurus were being discovered in 1976, paleontologists couldn’t figure out them as a whole new species. It is since the skeleton fossils have been incredibly hollow and distorted.
The authors as a result cautioned against applying semicircular canals as proxy to infer the precise orientation of skulls. They observed that diet regime correlated strongly with semicircular canal orientation, but not with head posture, whilst head posture and semicircular canal orientation were being strongly correlated with phylogeny.[twenty five]
The adductor muscle from the jaw appears to obtain connected for the quadrate in place of the supratemporal fenestra. Both equally this and the other mastication muscles had been very likely weak, and Nigersaurus is approximated to possess had one of many weakest bites on the sauropods.[3] Additionally, In line with Whitlock and colleagues in 2011, the tiny, approximately parallel mother nature with the tooth scratches and pits (because of grit, which might not be received as typically by higher-browsers) reveal that it ate reasonably comfortable, herbaceous plants for example minimal-expanding ferns.
Nigersaurus lived 110 million a long time back in what is now Niger, West Africa. Although what dinosaur has 500 teeth the fossils were being found in the Sahara Desert, when Nigersaurus lived the realm was a floodplain with huge rivers, conifer forests and lush vegetation.
In 1997, when paleontologist Paul Sereno first started to unearth the remains of the dinosaur in Niger's Sahara Desert, he didn’t know what to Assume. He was excavating bones inside a dry location known as Gadoufaoua, which experienced a prosperous fossil bed 1st discovered by French uranium miners.
The fragile nature on the Nigersaurus’s slender teeth and sensitive cranium built excavation and preservation particularly complicated. Yet, these problems were being satisfied with modern procedures in fossil Restoration and 3D reconstruction, allowing scientists to piece with each other the intricate specifics of its jaw along with the astonishing array of 500 teeth.