Skip to content
Mendozasaurus
EntityQ134799· pop 17· linked from 444 articles

Mendozasaurus

Sign in to save

Mendozasaurus is a genus of titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur. It was a member of Titanosauria, which were massive sauropods that were common on the southern landmasses during the Cretaceous. It is represented by several partial skeletons from a single locality within the Coniacian (lower Upper Cretaceous) Sierra Barrosa Formation in the south of Mendoza Province, northern Neuquén Basin, Argentina. The type species, Mendozasaurus neguyelap, was described by Argentine paleontologist Bernardo Javier González Riga in 2003. Mendozasaurus is the first dinosaur named from Mendoza Province, Argentina,

~2 min read

Encyclopedic overview

5 sections
Contents
  • Description
  • Classification
  • References
  • Further reading
  • External links

Mendozasaurus is a genus of titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur. It was a member of Titanosauria, which were massive sauropods that were common on the southern landmasses during the Cretaceous. It is represented by several partial skeletons from a single locality within the Coniacian (lower Upper Cretaceous) Sierra Barrosa Formation in the south of Mendoza Province, northern Neuquén Basin, Argentina. The type species, Mendozasaurus neguyelap, was described by Argentine paleontologist Bernardo Javier González Riga in 2003. Mendozasaurus is the first dinosaur named from Mendoza Province, Argentina, for which it was named.

== Description == thumb|left|Size comparison of two specimens This species belonged to the discovered clade Lognkosauria, a transitional group of titanosaurs which included the gigantic Futalognkosaurus and Puertasaurus. Like both of these animals, Mendozasaurus had a long neck with very wide cervical neural spines. Holtz estimated its length at . In 2010 Gregory S. Paul estimated Mendozasaurus at 20 meters (65.6 feet) in length and 16 tonnes (17.6 short tons) in weight.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Mendozasaurus” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.