Tianzhenosaurus

Tianzhenosaurus (Tianzhen + Greek sauros="lizard") is a genus of ankylosaurid dinosaurs discovered in Tianzhen County, at Kangdailiang near Zhaojiagou Village, in Shanxi Province, China, in the Late Cretaceous Huiquanpu Formation. Thus far, a virtually complete skull and postcranial skeleton have been assigned to the genus, which is monotypic (T. youngi Pang & Cheng, 1998).

Skull

Tianzhenosaurus
Temporal range: Late Cretaceous
Mounted skeleton
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Dinosauria
Order: Ornithischia
Family: Ankylosauridae
Subfamily: Ankylosaurinae
Genus: Tianzhenosaurus
Pang & Cheng, 1998
Species:
T. youngi
Binomial name
Tianzhenosaurus youngi
Pang & Cheng, 1998

This was a medium-sized ankylosaurian, the skull measuring 28 cm (11 in) in length, with a total body length around 4 m (13 ft).

Vickaryous et al. (2004) placed Tianzhenosaurus within the Ankylosauridae, nested as the sister group to Pinacosaurus. Some authors have suggested that Tianzhenosaurus is actually a junior synonym of Saichania chulsanensis.

See also

References

  • Carpenter, K. (ed.) The Armored Dinosaurs. pp. 454–483. Indiana University Press, Bloomington.
  • Pang, Q and Cheng, Z. 1998. "A new ankylosaur of the late Cretaceous from Tianzhen, Shanxi". Progress in Natural Science 8(3):326-334.
  • Vickaryous, Maryanska, and Weishampel 2004. Chapter Seventeen: "Ankylosauria". in The Dinosauria (2nd edition), Weishampel, D. B., Dodson, P., and Osmólska, H., editors. University of California Press.



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