Massive dinosaur discovered in Antarctica sheds light on life, distribution of sauro...( CHICAGOA new genus and species of dinos...)

CHICAGOA new genus and species of dinosaur from the Early Jurassic has been discovered in Antarctica. The massive plant-eating primitive sauropodomorph is called Glacialisaurus hammeri and lived about 190 million years ago.

The recently published description of the new dinosaur is based on partial foot, leg and ankle bones found on Mt. Kirkpatrick near the Beardmore Glacier in Antarctica at an elevation of more than 13,000 feet.

The fossils were painstakingly removed from the ice and rock using jackhammers, rock saws and chisels under extremely difficult conditions over the course of two field seasons, said Nathan Smith, a graduate student at The Field Museum. They are important because they help to establish that primitive sauropodomorph dinosaurs were more broadly distributed than previously thought, and that they coexisted with their cousins, the true sauropods.

The findings were published online Dec. 5 in the Acta Palaeontologica Poloncica (see http://www.app.pan.pl/). Diego Pol, a paleontologist at the Museo Paleontolgico Egidio Feruglio in Chubut, Argentina, is the other co-author of the research.

Sauropodomorph dinosaurs were the largest animals to ever walk the earth. They were long-necked herbivores and include Diplodocus and Apatosaurus. Their sister group is the theropods, which include Tyrannosaurus, Velociraptor, and modern birds.

Glacialisaurus hammeri was about 20-25 feet long and weighed about 4-6 tons . It was named after Dr. William Hammer, a professor at Augustana College who led the two field trips to Antarctica that uncovered the fossils. Glacialisaurus belongs to the sauropodomorph family Massopsondylidae, which may represent a secondary radiation of basal sauropodomorphs during the Early Jurassic.

Currently, the development and evolutionary relationships of the sauropodomorph dinosaurs are hotly debated by paleontologists. This discovery, however, helps to resolve some o
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