Giant Dinosaurs Hatched with Adult-like Proportions (2 of 9) (IMAGE)

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

Giant Dinosaurs Hatched with Adult-like Proportions (2 of 9)

Caption

UA 9998 is represented by the color silhouette and the orange femur. At death, this baby Rapetosaurus was only about 35 cm tall at the hip, and weighed less than 40 kg. The gray silhouette represents the size of a hatchling Rapetosaurus. Reconstructing hatching size is possible because of the similarity of limb bone proportions throughout life history, here illustrated by perinate, juvenile, and adult femora. This material relates to a paper that appeared in the April 22, 2016 issue of Science, published by AAAS. The paper, by K.C. Rogers at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn., and colleagues was titled, "Precociality in a tiny titanosaur from the Cretaceous of Madagascar."

Credit

K. Curry Rogers, M. Whitney, M. D'Emic, and B. Bagley

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