Quaesitosaurus

Taxobox
name = "Quaesitosaurus"
fossil_range = Late Cretaceous
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Sauropsida
superordo = Dinosauria
ordo = Saurischia
subordo = Sauropodomorpha
infraordo = Sauropoda
superfamilia = Titanosauroidea
familia = Nemegtosauridae
genus = "Quaesitosaurus"
genus_authority= Kurzanov & Bannikov, 1983
subdivision_ranks=Species
subdivision=
*"Q. orientalis" Kurzanov & Bannikov, 1983 (type)

"Quaesitosaurus" (meaning "extraordinary lizard") is a genus of titanosaurian sauropod found by Kurzanov and Bannikov in 1983. The type species is "Quaesitosaurus orientalis". "Quaesitosaurus" grew to 23 meters long. It lived from 85 to 70 million years ago during the Late Cretaceous (Santonian to Campanian ages). Its fossils, consisting solely of a partial skull, were found in the Barun Goyot Formation near Shar Tsav, Mongolia. Long, low and horse-like with frontally located peg-teeth, it is similar enough to the skulls of "Diplodocus" and its kin to have prompted informed speculation that the missing body was formed like those of diplodocids.

It is possible that "Nemegtosaurus", also known from only skull material, is a very close relative of "Quaesitosaurus", if not indeed a variation of the same animal.

References

* Hunt, A.P., Meyer, C.A., Lockley, M.G., and Lucas, S.G. (1994) "Archaeology, toothmarks and sauropod dinosaur taphonomy". "Gaia: Revista de Geociencias", Museu Nacional de Historia Natural, Lisbon, Portugal, 10: 225-232.
* Kurzanov, S. and Bannikov, A. (1983). "A new sauropod from the Upper Cretaceous of Mongolia". "Paleontologicheskii Zhurnal" 2: 90-96.

External links

* [http://www.users.qwest.net/~jstweet1/saltasauridae.htm Saltasauridae] from "Thescelosaurus"! (scroll down)
* [http://www.dinodata.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=7304&Itemid=67 "Quaesitosaurus"] from DinoData.org (technical)