''Eromangasaurus'' is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial n ...

elasmosaurid Elasmosauridae is an extinct family of plesiosaurs, often called elasmosaurs. They had the longest necks of the plesiosaurs and existed from the Hauterivian to the Maastrichtian stages of the Cretaceous, and represented one of the two groups of p ...

known from northern

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

of Australia.

Description

''Eromangasaurus'' is a medium-sized elasmosaurid, measuring in length and in body mass. It is known from the

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of seve ...

QM F11050, a nearly complete but badly crushed

skull The skull is a bone protective cavity for the brain. The skull is composed of four types of bone i.e., cranial bones, facial bones, ear ossicles and hyoid bone. However two parts are more prominent: the cranium and the mandible. In humans, t ...

and

mandible In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movable bon ...

. It was collected in

Maxwelton Maxwelton is a historic single-story house in Memphis, Tennessee, that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is the only extant example in Memphis of a Victorian piano box house. It is currently a private residence. The pi ...

, from the

Toolebuc Formation The Toolebuc Formation is a geological formation that extends from Queensland across South Australia and the Northern Territory in Australia, whose strata date back to the Albian stage of the Early Cretaceous. Dinosaurs,Weishampel ''et al.'', 2004 ...

of the

Eromanga Basin The Eromanga Basin is a large Mesozoic sedimentary basin in central and northern Australia. It covers parts of Queensland, the Northern Territory, South Australia, and New South Wales, and is a major component of the Great Artesian Basin. The ...

, dating to the late

Albian The Albian is both an age of the geologic timescale and a stage in the stratigraphic column. It is the youngest or uppermost subdivision of the Early/Lower Cretaceous Epoch/ Series. Its approximate time range is 113.0 ± 1.0 Ma to 100.5 ± ...

stage of the

Early Cretaceous The Early Cretaceous (geochronological name) or the Lower Cretaceous ( chronostratigraphic name), is the earlier or lower of the two major divisions of the Cretaceous. It is usually considered to stretch from 145 Ma to 100.5 Ma. Geology Pr ...

, about 103

million years ago The abbreviation Myr, "million years", is a unit of a quantity of (i.e. ) years, or 31.556926 teraseconds. Usage Myr (million years) is in common use in fields such as Earth science and cosmology. Myr is also used with Mya (million years ago). ...

. Sven Sachs mentioned some referred material from the same locality as the holotype, QM F12216-19, an anterior

cervical vertebra In tetrapods, cervical vertebrae (singular: vertebra) are the vertebrae of the neck, immediately below the skull. Truncal vertebrae (divided into thoracic and lumbar vertebrae in mammals) lie caudal (toward the tail) of cervical vertebrae. In ...

and QM F12217&2, associated posterior cervical vertebrae.

Discovery

''Eromangasaurus'' was first named by Benjamin P. Kear in

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris (dwarf planet), Er ...

and the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen( ...

is ''Eromangasaurus australis''. Benjamin P. Kear originally named QM F11050 as ''Eromangasaurus carinognathus''. However, earlier in 2005, Sven Sachs named a second species of '' Tuarangisaurus'', ''Tuarangisaurus australis'', on the basis of the same specimen and some referred material. This nominal has priority over ''E. carinognathus'', and therefore the latter is a junior synonym of ''T. australis''. Later studies of the holotype by Kear pointed out that this species is distinct enough from the type species of ''Tuarangisaurus'' to be placed in its own genus. ''Eromangasaurus'' was the only available name for the new combination ''Eromangasaurus australis''. ''E. australis'' is widely accepted today as the correct name for QM F11050. The generic name is derived from ''Eromanga'', in reference to the Eromanga Basin in which the holotype was found, and ''saurus'',

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

for "lizard". The specific name is named after Australia, in which the holotype was found.

References

Elasmosaurids Early Cretaceous reptiles of Australia Early Cretaceous plesiosaurs Plesiosaurs of Oceania Paleontology in Queensland Fossil taxa described in 2005 Sauropterygian genera {{plesiosaur-stub

Description

Discovery

See also

References