Sauropoda
Sign in to saveSauropoda (), whose members are called sauropods (; from sauro- + -pod; ), is a clade of saurischian ('lizard-hipped') dinosaurs. Sauropods had very long necks, long tails, small heads (relative to the rest of their body), and four thick, pillar-like legs. They are notable for the enormous sizes attained by some species, and the group includes the largest animals to have ever lived on land. Well-known genera include Alamosaurus, Apatosaurus, Argentinosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Brontosaurus, Camarasaurus, Diplodocus, Dreadnoughtus, and Mamenchisaurus.
AI overview
Sauropods were a group of long-necked dinosaurs with small heads, long tails, and thick pillar-like legs that included the largest land animals ever to exist. They matter because they represent an extraordinary achievement in animal evolution—some species reached enormous sizes that have never been matched by any terrestrial creature before or since.
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Article
24 sectionsContents
- Description
- Size
- Limbs and feet
- Air sacs
- Armor
- Teeth
- Necks
- Palaeobiology
- Ecology
- Herding and parental care
- Rearing stance
- Head and neck posture
- Trackways and locomotion
- Biomechanics and speed
- Body size
- Size in Neosauropoda
- Independent gigantism
- Dwarfism in sauropods
- Paleopathology and paleoparasitology
- History of discovery
- Classification
- See also
- References
- External links
Sauropoda (), whose members are called sauropods (; from sauro- + -pod; ), is a clade of saurischian ('lizard-hipped') dinosaurs. Sauropods had very long necks, long tails, small heads (relative to the rest of their body), and four thick, pillar-like legs. They are notable for the enormous sizes attained by some species, and the group includes the largest animals to have ever lived on land. Well-known genera include Alamosaurus, Apatosaurus, Argentinosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Brontosaurus, Camarasaurus, Diplodocus, Dreadnoughtus, and Mamenchisaurus.
The oldest known unequivocal sauropod dinosaurs are known from the Early Jurassic. Isanosaurus and Antetonitrus were originally described as Triassic sauropods, but their age, and in the case of Antetonitrus also its sauropod status, were subsequently questioned. Sauropod-like sauropodomorph tracks from the Fleming Fjord Formation (Greenland) might, however, indicate the occurrence of the group in the Late Triassic. By the Late Jurassic (150 million years ago), sauropods had become widespread (especially the diplodocids and brachiosaurids). By the Late Cretaceous, one group of sauropods, the titanosaurs, had replaced all others and had a near-global distribution. However, as with all other non-avian dinosaurs alive at the time, the titanosaurs died out in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event. Fossilised remains of sauropods have been found on every continent, including Antarctica.