Brachiosaurus

AI overview

Brachiosaurus was a giant sauropod dinosaur that roamed North America during the Late Jurassic period, roughly 155 to 145 million years ago, and is notable as one of the earliest dinosaurs formally described by paleontologists when American scientist Elmer S. Riggs first identified it in 1903 from Colorado fossils. The dinosaur's name refers to its distinctively long arms relative to its body size, and it ranks among the largest known land animals from the fossil record.

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Wikidata facts

Mass: 58
Image: 202009 Brachiosaurus altithorax.svg
Length: 30.0

Show 5 more facts

taxon name: Brachiosaurus
Commons category: Brachiosaurus
Commons gallery: Brachiosaurus
start time: 154000000-
end time: 150000000-

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via Wikidata · CC0

~71 min read

Article

26 sections

Contents

History of discovery
Holotype specimen
Assigned material
Formerly assigned species
''Brachiosaurus brancai'' and ''Brachiosaurus fraasi''
''Brachiosaurus atalaiensis''
''Brachiosaurus nougaredi''
Description
Size
General build
Postcranial skeleton
Skull
Classification
Paleobiology
Habits
Neck posture
Feeding and diet
Nostril function
Metabolism
Air sacs
Growth
Paleoecology
Cultural significance
References
Bibliography
External links

Brachiosaurus () is a genus of sauropod dinosaur that lived in North America during the Late Jurassic, about 155.6 to 145.5 million years ago. It was first described by American paleontologist Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found in the Colorado River valley in western Colorado, United States. Riggs named the dinosaur Brachiosaurus altithorax; the generic name is Greek for "arm lizard", in reference to its proportionately long arms, and the specific name means "deep chest". Brachiosaurus is estimated to have been between long; body mass estimates of the subadult holotype specimen range from . It had a disproportionately long neck, small skull, and large overall size, all of which are typical for sauropods. Atypically, Brachiosaurus had longer forelimbs than hindlimbs, which resulted in a steeply inclined trunk, and a proportionally shorter tail.

Brachiosaurus is the namesake genus of the family Brachiosauridae, which includes a handful of other similar sauropods. Most popular depictions of Brachiosaurus are in fact based on Giraffatitan, a genus of brachiosaurid dinosaur from the Tendaguru Formation of Tanzania. Giraffatitan was originally described by German paleontologist Werner Janensch in 1914 as a species of Brachiosaurus, B. brancai, but moved to its own genus in 2009. Three other species of Brachiosaurus have been named based on fossils found in Africa and Europe; two are no longer considered valid, and a third has become a separate genus, Lusotitan.