Lusotitan is a genus of herbivorous brachiosaurid

Brachiosauridae

Brachiosauridae are a family of dinosaurs, whose members are known as brachiosaurids. They were herbivorous quadrupeds with longer forelegs than hind legs - the name derives from the Greek for arm lizard - and long necks...

 sauropod dinosaur

Dinosaur

Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...

 from the Late Jurassic Period of Portugal

Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

.

In 1947 by Manuel de Matos, collector of the Geological Survey of Portugal, fossils of a large sauropod were found in the Portuguese Lourinhã Formation

Lourinhã Formation

The Lourinhã Formation is a geological formation in West Portugal, named for the municipality of Lourinhã, from which a wide array of fossils comes...

 dating to the Tithonian

Tithonian

In the geologic timescale the Tithonian is the latest age of the Late Jurassic epoch or the uppermost stage of the Upper Jurassic series. It spans the time between 150.8 ± 4 Ma and 145.5 ± 4 Ma...

 stage of the Late Jurassic

Late Jurassic

The Late Jurassic is the third epoch of the Jurassic Period, and it spans the geologic time from 161.2 ± 4.0 to 145.5 ± 4.0 million years ago , which is preserved in Upper Jurassic strata. In European lithostratigraphy, the name "Malm" indicates rocks of Late Jurassic age...

. In 1957 the remains were by Albert-Félix de Lapparent

Albert-Félix de Lapparent

Albert-Félix de Lapparent was a French palaeontologist. He was also a Sulpician priest. He undertook a number of fossil-hunting explorations in the Sahara desert. He contributed greatly to our knowledge of dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures...

 and Georges Zbyszewski named as a new species of Brachiosaurus

Brachiosaurus

Brachiosaurus is a genus of sauropod dinosaur from the Jurassic Morrison Formation of North America. It was first described by Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found in the Grand River Canyon of western Colorado, in the United States. Riggs named the dinosaur Brachiosaurus altithorax,...

: Brachiosaurus atalaiensis. The specific name referred to the site, Atalaia. It was in 2003 by Octávio Mateus

Octávio Mateus

Octávio Mateus is a Portuguese dinosaur paleontologist and biologist . He received his PhD at Universidade Nova de Lisboa in 2005...

 and Miguel Telles Antunes

Miguel Telles Antunes

Miguel Telles Antunes is a Portuguese palaeontologist. He is specializes, among other things, in dinosaur palaeontology.Antunes is the director of the Museu Maynense da Academia das Ciências de Lisboa...

 renamed a separate genus: Lusotitan. The type species

Type species

In biological nomenclature, a type species is both a concept and a practical system which is used in the classification and nomenclature of animals and plants. The value of a "type species" lies in the fact that it makes clear what is meant by a particular genus name. A type species is the species...

 is Lusotitan atalaiensis. The generic name is derived from Luso, the Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 name for an inhabitant of Lusitania

Lusitania

Lusitania or Hispania Lusitania was an ancient Roman province including approximately all of modern Portugal south of the Douro river and part of modern Spain . It was named after the Lusitani or Lusitanian people...

, and Greek Titan

Titan (mythology)

In Greek mythology, the Titans were a race of powerful deities, descendants of Gaia and Uranus, that ruled during the legendary Golden Age....

, a mythological giant.

The finds consisted of a partial skeleton

Skeleton

The skeleton is the body part that forms the supporting structure of an organism. There are two different skeletal types: the exoskeleton, which is the stable outer shell of an organism, and the endoskeleton, which forms the support structure inside the body.In a figurative sense, skeleton can...

 lacking the skull and individual vertebrae uncovered in several locations. De Lapparent did not assign a holotype

Holotype

A holotype is a single physical example of an organism, known to have been used when the species was formally described. It is either the single such physical example or one of several such, but explicitly designated as the holotype...

. In 2003 Mateus chose the skeleton as the lectotype

Lectotype

In botanical nomenclature and zoological nomenclature, a lectotype is a kind of name-bearing type. When a species was originally described on the basis of a name-bearing type consisting of multiple specimens, one of those may be designated as the lectotype...

. Its bones have the inventory numbers MIGM 4798, 4801-10, 4938, 4944, 4950, 4952, 4958, 4964-6, 4981-2, 4985, 8807, 8793-5. These remains include 28 vertebrae and elements of the appendicular skeleton.

It has been estimated that Lusotitan was 25 meters (82 feet) long. It had long forearms, one of the reasons Mateus assigned it to the Brachiosauridae

Brachiosauridae

Brachiosauridae are a family of dinosaurs, whose members are known as brachiosaurids. They were herbivorous quadrupeds with longer forelegs than hind legs - the name derives from the Greek for arm lizard - and long necks...

.

External links

• Brachiosauridae from Thescelosaurus!