''Gobititan'' is a genus of herbivorous sauropod

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...

from the Aptian

faunal stage In chronostratigraphy, a stage is a succession of rock strata laid down in a single age on the geologic timescale, which usually represents millions of years of deposition. A given stage of rock and the corresponding age of time will by convent ...

of the Early

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 145 to 66 million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era, as well as the longest. At around 79 million years, it is the longest geological period of ...

. The name of this genus is derived from the Gobi desert region and the

Titans In Greek mythology, the Titans ( grc, οἱ Τῑτᾶνες, ''hoi Tītânes'', , ''ho Tītân'') were the pre-Olympian gods. According to the ''Theogony'' of Hesiod, they were the twelve children of the primordial parents Uranus (Sky) and Gai ...

of Greek mythology, which is a reference to its large body size. The specific name ''shenzhouensis'', is derived from "Shenzhou", an ancient name for China.

Description

''Gobititan'' can be distinguished from other titanosauriforms based on features of the caudal vertebrae. Compared with advanced titanosaurs, where the number of caudal vertebrae had been reduced to less than 35, ''Gobititan'' had a relatively high number of caudal vertebrae, which was interpreted as a basal trait.

Gregory S. Paul Gregory Scott Paul (born December 24, 1954) is an American freelance researcher, author and illustrator who works in paleontology, and more recently has examined sociology and theology. He is best known for his work and research on theropod dino ...

estimated that ''Gobititan'' was long and weighed .

Discovery and naming

The genus is based on one partial skeleton,

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of sever ...

IVPP 12579, which consists of a series of 41 caudal vertebrae and an incomplete left hindlimb. Its remains were recovered in the summer of 1999 at the "Middle Gray unit" (also known as the Xiagou Formation) of the

Xinminbao Group The Xīnmínbǎo Group () is a group of geological formations in north central China. They occur across a large depression (geology), depression between the Altai mountains of Mongolia to the north and the Qilian Shan, Qilian mountains of the Qing ...

in the Gongpoquan Basin in Gansu, China. The

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specime ...

, ''Gobititan shenzhouensis'' was named and described by You, Tang and Luo in 2003 and was classified as a basal

titanosaur Titanosaurs (or titanosaurians; members of the group Titanosauria) were a diverse group of sauropod dinosaurs, including genera from all seven continents. The titanosaurs were the last surviving group of long-necked sauropods, with taxa still thr ...

. This specimen is housed in the collection of the

Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology The Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP; ) of China is a research institution and collections repository for fossils, including many dinosaur and pterosaur specimens (many from the Yixian Formation). As its name sugges ...

, in

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

, China.

Classification

In its original description, ''Gobititan'' was considered to be a basal

closely related to ''

Tangvayosaurus ''Tangvayosaurus'' (meaning "Tang Vay lizard") is a genus of sauropod dinosaur from the Aptian-Albian age Lower Cretaceous Gres superieurs Formation of Savannakhet Province, Laos. It was a basal somphospondylan, about 15 m long, and is ...

'', suggesting that titanosaurs might have originated in Asia no later than the Early Cretaceous. However, based on the fact that the fifth digit is still present on the foot (a trait unknown in all other titanosaurs), more recent research has generally considered it to be a

titanosauriform Macronaria is a clade of sauropod dinosaurs. Macronarians are named after the large diameter of the nasal opening of their skull, known as the external naris, which exceeded the size of the orbit, the skull opening where the eye is located (hence ...

, more specifically a member of the

Somphospondyli Somphospondyli is an extinct clade of titanosauriform sauropods that lived from the Late Jurassic until the end of the Late Cretaceous, comprising all titanosauriforms more closely related to Titanosauria proper than Brachiosauridae. The remains ...

. Nevertheless, some analyses still recover ''Gobititan'' as a titanosaur.

References

Titanosaurs Early Cretaceous dinosaurs of Asia Paleontology in Gansu {{Sauropodomorph-stub Albian life