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Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana

The life appearance of dinosaurs is a hotly debated topic in the world of paleontology, especially when it comes to dinosaur integument. In the case of sauropods, however, the topic is harder to properly discuss due to the limited amount of fossilized skin impressions that have been discovered. Thus...

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Autores principales: Gallagher, Tess, Poole, Jason, Schein, Jason P.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PeerJ Inc. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8098675/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33986987
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.11202
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author Gallagher, Tess
Poole, Jason
Schein, Jason P.
author_facet Gallagher, Tess
Poole, Jason
Schein, Jason P.
author_sort Gallagher, Tess
collection PubMed
description The life appearance of dinosaurs is a hotly debated topic in the world of paleontology, especially when it comes to dinosaur integument. In the case of sauropods, however, the topic is harder to properly discuss due to the limited amount of fossilized skin impressions that have been discovered. Thus far, the fossil record of sauropod integument fossils include titanosaur embryos from Patagonia, possible keratinous diplodocid dorsal spines, track ways with foot impressions, and other isolated skin impressions found in association with sauropod body fossils. Several prominent integument fossils have been found at the Mother’s Day Quarry, located in the Bighorn Basin, Montana. These discoveries may bring new important information about diplodocids, specifically Diplodocus sp. Here we describe newly uncovered fossilized skin that gives evidence of scale diversity in the genus Diplodocus. The scales themselves represent tubercles, and exhibit various shapes including rectangular, ovoid, polygonal, and globular scales. The tubercles are small in size, the biggest of which only reach about 10mm in length. Considering how diverse the scale shapes are in such a small area of skin, it is possible that these distinct scale shapes may represent a transition on the body from one region to another: perhaps from the abdomen to dorsal side, or abdomen to shoulder. Based on analysis of extant integument and scale orientation of crocodilians, it is possible to hypothesize on the location of the integument relative to the body as well as the size and relative maturational status of the individual.
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spelling pubmed-80986752021-05-12 Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana Gallagher, Tess Poole, Jason Schein, Jason P. PeerJ Evolutionary Studies The life appearance of dinosaurs is a hotly debated topic in the world of paleontology, especially when it comes to dinosaur integument. In the case of sauropods, however, the topic is harder to properly discuss due to the limited amount of fossilized skin impressions that have been discovered. Thus far, the fossil record of sauropod integument fossils include titanosaur embryos from Patagonia, possible keratinous diplodocid dorsal spines, track ways with foot impressions, and other isolated skin impressions found in association with sauropod body fossils. Several prominent integument fossils have been found at the Mother’s Day Quarry, located in the Bighorn Basin, Montana. These discoveries may bring new important information about diplodocids, specifically Diplodocus sp. Here we describe newly uncovered fossilized skin that gives evidence of scale diversity in the genus Diplodocus. The scales themselves represent tubercles, and exhibit various shapes including rectangular, ovoid, polygonal, and globular scales. The tubercles are small in size, the biggest of which only reach about 10mm in length. Considering how diverse the scale shapes are in such a small area of skin, it is possible that these distinct scale shapes may represent a transition on the body from one region to another: perhaps from the abdomen to dorsal side, or abdomen to shoulder. Based on analysis of extant integument and scale orientation of crocodilians, it is possible to hypothesize on the location of the integument relative to the body as well as the size and relative maturational status of the individual. PeerJ Inc. 2021-04-29 /pmc/articles/PMC8098675/ /pubmed/33986987 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.11202 Text en © 2021 Gallagher et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
spellingShingle Evolutionary Studies
Gallagher, Tess
Poole, Jason
Schein, Jason P.
Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana
title Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana
title_full Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana
title_fullStr Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana
title_full_unstemmed Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana
title_short Evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late Jurassic Sauropod Diplodocus sp. from the Mother’s Day Quarry, Montana
title_sort evidence of integumentary scale diversity in the late jurassic sauropod diplodocus sp. from the mother’s day quarry, montana
topic Evolutionary Studies
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8098675/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33986987
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.11202
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