Tylosaurinae
| Tylosaurinae | ||||||||||||
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Tylosaurus pembinensis from the Campanium of Kansas |
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| Temporal occurrence | ||||||||||||
| Upper Cretaceous ( Santonium to Maastrichtian ) | ||||||||||||
| 86.3 to 66 million years | ||||||||||||
| Locations | ||||||||||||
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Tylosaurinae | ||||||||||||
| Williston , 1897 | ||||||||||||
The Tylosaurinae are a subfamily of the mosasaurs . Above all, they included large forms, which in their time were the top predators of the oceans.
features
At the front end of their skull they had a ramspur that was toothless in the upper and lower jaw. Perhaps it could be used to kill or incapacitate prey or rivals by ramming them, much like dolphins do with sharks. Their body was relatively short, the tail relatively long and without a caudal fin. Zygapophyses (long bone rods that connected the individual vertebral elements ) were rudimentary or absent. The hemal arches on the underside of the caudal spine were not fused with the vertebral centers. The humerus , radius, and ulna were long, a primitive feature. The carpal bones were reduced and the number of toe bones increased (hyperphalangia). Your body weight was probably relatively light, and the porous bones may contain fat. Limb belts and fins were rather small.
Way of life
The Tylosaurinae were probably neither fast swimmers nor the strongest mosasaurs. They hid their prey and rammed it in a sudden foray.
Genera
swell
- Richard Ellis: Sea Dragons. Predators of the Prehistoric Oceans. University Press of Kansas, Lawrence KS 2003, ISBN 0-7006-1269-6 .
- Phytosauria Translation and Pronunciation ( Memento June 11, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
Individual evidence
- ↑ Takuya Konishi, Paulina Jiménez-Huidobro, Michael W. Caldwell. The Smallest-Known Neonate Individual of Tylosaurus (Mosasauridae, Tylosaurinae) Sheds New Light on the Tylosaurine Rostrum and Heterochrony. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 2018; 1 DOI: 10.1080 / 02724634.2018.1510835
- ↑ Rodrigo A. Otero, Sergio Soto-Acuña, David Rubilar-Rogers, Carolina S. Gutstein. Kaikaifilu gen. Et sp. nov., a new large mosasaur (Squamata, Mosasauridae) from the upper Maastrichtian of Antarctica. Cretaceous Research, 2016; DOI: 10.1016 / j.cretres.2016.11.002