Centro Regional de Investigaciones Científicas y Transferencia Tecnológica de La Rioja (CRILAR), Provincia de La Rioja, UNLaR, SEGEMAR, UNCa, CONICET, Entre Ríos y Mendoza s/n (5301), Anillaco, La Rioja, Argentina.
Instituto de Biología de la Conservación y Paleobiología (IBICOPA), DACEFyN-UNLaR, 5300, La Rioja, Argentina.
Commun Biol. 2020 Oct 27;3(1):622. doi: 10.1038/s42003-020-01338-w.
South American titanosaurians have been central to the study of the evolution of Cretaceous sauropod dinosaurs. Despite their remarkable diversity, the fragmentary condition of several taxa and the scarcity of records outside Patagonia and southwestern Brazil have hindered the study of continental-scale paleobiogeographic relationships. We describe two new Late Cretaceous titanosaurians from Quebrada de Santo Domingo (La Rioja, Argentina), which help to fill a gap between these main areas of the continent. Our phylogenetic analysis recovers both new species, and several Brazilian taxa, within Rinconsauria. The data suggest that, towards the end of the Cretaceous, this clade spread throughout southern South America. At the same locality, we discovered numerous accumulations of titanosaurian eggs, likely related to the new taxa. With eggs distributed in three levels along three kilometres, the new site is one of the largest ever found and provides further evidence of nesting site philopatry among Titanosauria.
南美泰坦巨龙类恐龙一直是研究白垩纪蜥脚类恐龙进化的核心。尽管它们具有显著的多样性,但由于几个分类群的化石残缺不全,以及在巴塔哥尼亚和巴西西南部以外地区的记录稀缺,阻碍了对大陆范围古生物地理关系的研究。我们描述了来自阿根廷拉里奥哈省圣多明各峡谷(Quebrada de Santo Domingo)的两个新的晚白垩世泰坦巨龙类恐龙,它们有助于填补该大陆主要地区之间的空白。我们的系统发育分析结果表明,这两个新种和一些巴西分类群都属于腕龙类。这些数据表明,在白垩纪末期,这个分支在整个南美洲南部扩散。在同一地点,我们还发现了大量的泰坦巨龙类恐龙蛋化石,可能与新种有关。新发现的地点有三个地层,沿三公里分布,是有史以来发现的最大的地点之一,为泰坦巨龙类的筑巢地亲缘选择提供了进一步的证据。