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Nigersaurus taqueti
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Nigersaurus taqueti

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Also known as N. taqueti

Nigersaurus () is a genus of rebbachisaurid sauropod dinosaur that lived during the middle Cretaceous period, about 115 to 105 million years ago. It was discovered in the Elrhaz Formation in an area called Gadoufaoua, in Niger. Fossils of this dinosaur were first described in 1976, but it was only named Nigersaurus taqueti in 1999 after further and more complete remains were found and described. The genus name means "Niger reptile", and the specific name honours the palaeontologist Philippe Taquet, who discovered the first remains.

In the Vinony graph

Vinony's link graph records 461 inbound references to Nigersaurus taqueti, and connects out to Sauropodomorpha, Rebbachisauridae and Diplodocoidea.

Vinony files it under Albian dinosaurs, Aptian dinosaurs and Dinosaur genera.

Vinony links it to 29 Wikipedia language editions.

Wikidata facts

Named after
Philippe Taquet
Image
Nigersaurus skull aus.jpg
Show 7 more facts
Commons category
Nigersaurus
taxon name
Nigersaurus taqueti
taxon rank
species
taxon common name
尼日尔龙
start time
115000000-
end time
105000000-
time period
Early Cretaceous
Sources (1)

via Wikidata · CC0

~23 min read

Encyclopedic overview

11 sections
Contents
  • History of discovery
  • Description
  • Skull
  • Postcranial skeleton
  • Classification
  • Palaeobiology
  • Diet and feeding
  • Head posture
  • Palaeoenvironment
  • References
  • External links

Nigersaurus () is a genus of rebbachisaurid sauropod dinosaur that lived during the middle Cretaceous period, about 115 to 105 million years ago. It was discovered in the Elrhaz Formation in an area called Gadoufaoua, in Niger. Fossils of this dinosaur were first described in 1976, but it was only named Nigersaurus taqueti in 1999 after further and more complete remains were found and described. The genus name means "Niger reptile", and the specific name honours the palaeontologist Philippe Taquet, who discovered the first remains.

Small for a sauropod, Nigersaurus was about long, and had a short neck. It weighed around , comparable to a modern elephant. Its skull was very specialised for feeding, with large fenestrae and thin bones. It had a wide muzzle filled with more than 500 teeth, which were replaced at a rapid rate: around every 14 days. The jaws may have borne a keratinous sheath. Unlike other tetrapods, the tooth-bearing bones of its jaws were rotated transversely relative to the rest of the skull, so that all of its teeth were located far to the front. Its skeleton was highly pneumatised (filled with air spaces connected to air sacs), but the limbs were robustly built.

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

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