Isisaurus is a member of the sauropod family. It was a herbivore. It was named after the Indian Statistical Institute. It could grow to be as long as 69 ft and is related to Titanosaurus, but with various advancements. It has a long, thick neck and is found in India.
Discovery and naming[]
The type specimen of Isisaurus colberti, ISI R 335/1-65, was originally described and named as Titanosaurus colberti by Sohan Lal Jain and Saswati Bandyopadhyay in 1997, the specific name honouring Edwin Harris Colbert, but was placed in its own genus, by Wilson and Upchurch, in 2003. It had a "bizarre" appearance with a short, vertically directed neck and long forelimbs, making it considerably different from other sauropods. The humerus is 148 centimetres long.[2] Based on this specimen, Isisaurus would have grown to about 18 meters (60 feet) in length and weighed about 14,000 kg (15 tons).
Isisaurus is known from much better remains than most titanosaurs. Most of its postcranial skeleton is known. The skeletal material Jain and Bandyopadhyay found between 1984 and 1986 was "in associated and mostly articulated condition;" it included cervical, dorsal, sacral and caudal vertebrae, ribs, pelvis, scapula, coracoid, left forelimb and other bones, though skull, hindlimb and foot bones were missing. The site locality is Dongargaon Hill, which is in a Maastrichtian crevasse splay claystone in the Lameta Formation of India. Dongargaon Hill is at Manjar Sumba, Maharashtra.
Description[]
Size compared to a human
Isisaurus is a kind of dinosaur genus existed in the late Cretaceous period. It is believed that those species are the inhabitants of current India. Isisaurus belongs to the group of sauropod. This herbivore species comes under the classification of Chordata, Reptila, Dinosauria, Sauropodomorpha, Sauropoda, Titanosauria, Antarctosauridae.
Sohan Lal Jain and Saswati Bandyopadhyay were the first to name this type specimen Isisaurus colberti, ISI R 335/1-65 as Titanosaurus colberti, 1997. The specimen Isisaurus colberti, has been named after Edwin Harris Colbert. But later in 2003, it has been placed in its own genus, by Wilson and Upchurch. This is because the genus had a strange appearance with a short, vertical directed neck and long forelimbs, the structure making it different from rest of the sauropods.
Researches revealed that the humerus of the specimen was 148 centimetres long and hence it is predicted that the Isisaurus would have grown to about 18 meters length and weighed about 15,000 kg. The type of dinosaur has been considered as the most unique one among the sauropods as it has a different inbuilt skeletal system having its radius and ulna far shorter than its humerus with shortened and tall cervicals.
Paleobiology[]
Fungus in coprolites believed to have been voided by Isisaurus indicate that it ate leaves from several species of tree, since these fungi are known to be pathogens which infect tree leaves.
Appearance in other media[]
Jurassic Park[]
- It appears in the book Dinosaurs by Thomas Holtz that Gray Mitchell has in his room in Jurassic World and in MacMillan's Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Animals from which Michael Crichton used as a reference for his dinosaurs in the novel Jurassic Park.
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