Paleontologists enjoy unearthed a neatly-preserved cervical vertebra of a medium-sized abelisaurid ceratosaur in the Bahariya Oasis of the Western Barren map of Egypt. It represents the major confirmed abelisaurid fossil from the Bahariya Formation and the oldest definitive file of abelisaurids from Egypt and northeastern Africa more on the total.
Reconstruction of the paleoecosystem of the Upper Cretaceous Bahariya Formation of the Bahariya Oasis, Western Barren map of Egypt, exhibiting differ of beefy-bodied theropod dinosaurs. In the foreground, the unidentified abelisaurid described herein (appropriate) confronts the spinosaurid Spinosaurus aegyptiacus (left center, with the lungfish Retodus tuberculatus in jaws) and the carcharodontosaurid Carcharodontosaurus saharicus (appropriate center) whereas two folk of the stomatosuchid crocodyliform Stomatosuchus inermis (left) discover on. In the background, a herd of the titanosaurian sauropod Paralititan stromeri (left) warily regards these theropods and two folk of the bahariasaurid Bahariasaurus ingens (a long way appropriate) whereas a diminutive flock of an undescribed pterosaur soars above. The vegetation is dominated by the mangrove-like tree fern Weichselia reticulata. Image credit: Andrew McAfee, Carnegie Museum of Natural Historical previous.
Abelisaurid ceratosaurs enjoy been amongst basically the most diverse and geographically in style medium- to beefy-bodied theropod dinosaurs at some stage in the Cretaceous length in the southern landmasses.
They occupied carnivorous niches in South The USA, continental Africa, Indo-Madagascar, Europe and more than likely Australia.
Nonetheless, no subject the rich and ever-rising non-avian dinosaur file of Egypt, only extremely fragmentary evidence of abelisaurids got here to light from this nation and northeastern Africa in customary.
The new fossil — a neatly-preserved vertebra from the irascible of the neck — used to be recovered in 2016 from the Bahariya Formation in Egypt.
The particular particular person dinosaur the specimen belonged to lived roughly 98 million years prior to now (Upper Cretaceous epoch).
It likely had a bulldog-like face, diminutive enamel, diminutive arms, and used to be 6 m (20 feet) in length.
“Proper thru the mid-Cretaceous, the Bahariya Oasis would’ve been without a doubt one of basically the most grisly areas on the planet,” acknowledged Belal Salem, a graduate student at Ohio University.
“How all these beefy predators managed to coexist remains a mystery, though