Macropodosaurus

Macropodosaurus is an ichnogenus of therizinosaurid footprints from the Late Cretaceous. The genus and type ichnospecies Macropodosaurus gravis were described and named in 1964 by S. A. Zakharov, and the material consisted of a series of four-toed footprints about 50 cm (500 mm) long and 30 cm (300 mm) wide found in Cenomanian sediments at Tajikistan, noting that they were made by a bipedal four-toed dinosaur and not a quadrupedal animal.[1] More later, in 2006 Andrey G. Sennikov re-examined these footprints and concluded that a therizinosaurid dinosaur likely made those tracks. He compared Macropodosaurus with the feet of Erlikosaurus and Therizinosaurus noting that in a plantigrade position they match the morphology of the tracks. He considered these tracks to be more associated with therizinosaurids and proposed a plantigrade stance for them.[2] Macropodosaurus has also been discovered in the Maastrichtian strata of Poland in 2007. This footprint is reminiscent of the tracks described by Zakharov and was assigned to Macropodosaurus sp. This discovery may indicate the presence of therizinosaurids in Europe.[3] Molina-Pérez and Larramendi also supported a therizinosaurid assignment to the footprints described by Zakharov and proposed an animal around 4.4–5 m (14–16 ft) and 510–806 kg (1,124–1,777 lb) for a 56 cm (560 mm) long footprint.[4] In 2017 Masrour with colleagues reported more Macropodosaurus footprints in what is now Morocco, further expanding the biogeographical range of therizinosaurids.[5]

Macropodosaurus
Temporal range: Late Cretaceous,
~100.5–66.0 Ma
Trace fossil classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Dinosauria
Clade: Saurischia
Clade: Theropoda
Superfamily: †Therizinosauroidea
Family: †Therizinosauridae
Ichnogenus: †Macropodosaurus
Zakharov, 1964
Type ichnospecies
†Macropodosaurus gravis
Zakharov, 1964

See also

References
  1. Zakharov, S. A. (1964). "О сеноманском динозавре, следы которого обнаружены в долине р.Ширкент" [On the Cenomanian dinosaur, the tracks of which were found in the Shirkent River Valley]. In Reiman, V. M. (ed.). Paleontology of Tajikistan (in Russian). Dushanbe: Academy of Sciences of Tajik S.S.R. Press. pp. 31−35.
  2. Sennikov, A. G. (2006). "Читая следы сегнозавров" [Reading segnosaur tracks]. Priroda (in Russian). 5: 58−67.
  3. Gierliński, G. D (2015). "New Dinosaur Footprints from the Upper Cretaceous of Poland in the Light of Paleogeographic Context". Ichnos. 22 (3–4): 220−226. doi:10.1080/10420940.2015.1063489.
  4. Molina-Pérez; Larramendi (2016). Récords y curiosidades de los dinosaurios Terópodos y otros dinosauromorfos. Spain: Larousse. p. 52.
  5. Masrour, Moussa; Lkebir, Noura; Pérez-Lorente, Félix (2017). "Anza palaeoichnological site. Late Cretaceous. Morocco. Part II. Problems of large dinosaur trackways and the first African Macropodosaurus trackway". Journal of African Earth Sciences. 134: 776−793. Bibcode:2017JAfES.134..776M. doi:10.1016/j.jafrearsci.2017.04.019. ISSN 1464-343X.


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