Plioplatecarpus

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Plioplatecarpus

Plioplatecarpus is a genus

Genus

A genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the classification of living and fossil organisms. The taxonomic ranks are domain , kingdom , phylum, class , order , family , genus, and species....
of mosasaur

Mosasaur

Mosasaurs were serpentine marine reptiles. The first fossil remains were discovered in a limestone quarry at Maastricht on the Meuse in 1778. These ferocious marine predators are now considered to be the closest relatives of snakes, due to cladistic analysis of symptomatic similarities in jaw and skull anatomies....
lizard. Like all mosasaurs, it lived in the late Cretaceous

Cretaceous

The Cretaceous , usually abbreviated K for its German translation Kreide, is a geologic period from circa to million years ago . In the geologic timescale, the Cretaceous follows on the Jurassic period and is followed by the Paleogene period....
period, about 83.5 million years ago.
eyes of Plioplatecarpus are proportionally larger than those of many mosasaur genus, although the skull is relatively short.

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Encyclopedia

Plioplatecarpus is a genus

Genus

Mosasaur

Cretaceous

Description

The eyes of Plioplatecarpus are proportionally larger than those of many mosasaur genus, although the skull is relatively short. It has fewer teeth than most mosasaurs (only about 12, or less), but they are greatly recurved. This suggests that Plioplatecarpus would have hunted relatively small prey that it could grab very precisely.

Discovery

Plioplatecarpus was first found in Europe

Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
by paleontologist Louis Dollo

Louis Dollo

Louis Antoine Marie Jos?ph Dollo was a France-born Belgian people palaeontologist, known for formulating Dollo's law. In 1878, he supervised the excavation of the famous, multiple Iguanodon find, at Bernissart, Belgium....
(P.marshi), in 1882. It was relatively incomplete, but more fossil

Fossil

Fossils are the preserved remains or trace fossil of animals, plants, and other organisms from the remote past. The totality of fossils, both discovered and undiscovered, and their placement in fossiliferous Rock formations and sedimentary rock layers is known as the fossil record....
s would soon turn up. In North America

North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
, Edward Drinker Cope

Edward Drinker Cope

Edward Drinker Cope was an United States paleontology and comparative anatomy, as well as a noted herpetology and ichthyology.Born to a wealthy Society of Friends family, Cope quickly distinguished himself as a child prodigy interested in science; he published his first scientific paper in 1859....
found another mosasaur in 1869, but had identified it as Mosasaurus
Mosasaurus

Mosasaurus was a genus of mosasaur, a carnivorous, aquatic lizard, somewhat resembling a flippered crocodile, with elongated heavy jaws. The genus lived in the Maastrichtian age of the Cretaceous period , around 70-65 millions years ago in the area of modern Western Europe....
. It would later be reclassified as Plioplatecarpus, as would Cope's Liodon, in 1870. Liodon would be reclassified as Platecarpus
Platecarpus

Platecarpus is an extinct genus of lizard belonging to the mosasaur family. It was about 4.30 meters long.Like other mosasaurs, Platecarpus had a long, laterally flattened tail, steering flippers and deadly, tooth-lined jaws....
, and later as Prognathodon
Prognathodon

Prognathodon is an extinct genus of marine reptile belonging to the mosasaur family. It had protective bony rings surrounding its eye sockets, indicating it lived in deep water....
. However, some have placed it in the genus Plioplatecarpus.

Distribution

Plioplatecarpus has been found in many locations around the world (most mosasurs were fairly wide-spread). Pliopltecarpus has been found in the Pierre shale

Pierre Shale

The Pierre Shale is a geologic formation or series in the Upper Cretaceous which occurs east of the Rocky Mountains from North Dakota to New Mexico....
of Kansas

Kansas

The State of Kansas is a Midwestern U.S. state in the Central United States of the United States of America, an area often referred to as the United States "Heartland"....
, Demopolis Chalk

Demopolis Chalk Formation

The Demopolis Chalk Formation is a geological Formation in North America, within the United States states of Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee....
of Alabama

Alabama

Alabama is a state located in the Southern United States of the United States of America. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west....
, and also in Mississippi

Mississippi

Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Deep South of the United States. Jackson, Mississippi is the state capital and largest city. The state's name comes from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, and takes its name from the Anishinaabe language word misi-ziibi ....
, North Dakota

North Dakota

North Dakota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States and Western United States regions of the United States of America. North Dakota is the 19th largest state by area in the US; it is the 48th most populous, with just over 640,000 residents as of 2006....
, South Dakota

South Dakota

South Dakota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States of the United States of America. It is named after the Lakota people and Sioux Sioux Native Americans in the United States tribes....
, Canada

Canada

Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean....
, Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic countries on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden has land borders with Norway to the west and Finland to the northeast, and it is connected to Denmark by the ?resund Bridge in the south....
, The Netherlands, and, quite recently, Wyoming

Wyoming

The State of Wyoming is a sparsely populated U.S. state in the Northwestern United States of the United States. The majority of the state is dominated by the mountain ranges and rangelands of the Rocky Mountains, while the easternmost section of the state is a high altitude prairie region known as the High Plains ....
. The Wyoming specimen is so far the only one of its kind to be found in the state, and may represent a new species of Plioplatecarpus. It is being prepared at the Tate Geological Museum, and has been named Oomtar.