Tabla de Contenidos
The Giganotosaurus (whose name means “giant southern reptile”) were dinosaurs that inhabited the Earth about 98 million years ago, during the late Cretaceous, in the territory that is now Argentina. The first fossils of these animals were discovered in 1993 by a worker named Ruben Carolini in Patagonia. Carolini then contacted scientists Rodolfo Coria and Leonardo Salgado, who studied the finds and named the species Giganotosaurus carolinii .
Dimensions
Giganotosaurus was a genus of large carnivorous dinosaurs that weighed more than 7,000 kg. From the fossil remains found, it is estimated that they were approximately 14 meters long and 5 meters high. For this reason, they are considered among the largest predators discovered so far.
The Giganotosaurus skull measured almost two meters. However, these animals had small brains, about the size of a banana, which they specialized in interpreting odor stimuli. Their mouths were made up of sharp, serrated teeth 20 cm long.
Motion
Although Giganotosaurus are known to have walked on their hind legs, there is no agreement among the scientific community about how fast they were; Because the bones of these dinosaurs turned out to be lighter than those of most of the large carnivores of their time, some scientists think that this feature helped them run faster than other animals of their kind. Also, being carnivores, it is likely that they have had to move with agility to catch their prey.
However, other scientists say it’s more likely that Giganotosaurus moved slowly and carefully, as a high-speed fall could have killed them, considering their tiny arms couldn’t cushion their enormous weight.
Feeding
During the Cretaceous, angiosperm plants prospered, which were the food of the dinosaurs known as sauropods, large herbivores with long necks. Aeolosaurus (15 m long and 10,500 kg) and Antarctosaurus (30 m long and 34,000 kg) were sauropods that coexisted with Giganotosaurus . Scientists think that these sauropods were the prey of Giganotosaurus , who flocked to hunt them considering the large size of their loot. This implies that Giganotosaurus had hunting habits like lions, which can hunt much larger prey when grouped together for this purpose.
taxonomic classification
Giganotosaurus are terapods, dinosaurs characterized by standing on their hind legs and having sharp teeth . The species Tyrannosaurus rex , the most famous of the therapods, also belongs to this group . However, T. rex lived in North America and nearly 30 million after the larger Giganotosaurus . Regardless of these differences, the two classes of dinosaurs had large heads, small front legs, and small brains.
Sources
Barrick, R., Showers, W. Thermophysiology and biology of giganotosaurus: comparison with tyrannosaurus . Paleontological Society, 1999.
Goecke, M. Giganotosaurus . ABDO Publishing Company., Minnesota, United States of America, 2007.
