Tylosaurus proriger and T. nepaeolicus holotype specimens redescribed (free pdf)
72 views
Skip to first unread message
Ben Creisler
Jul 1, 2026, 3:20:11 PM (yesterday) Jul 1
to DinosaurMa...@googlegroups.com
Ben Creisler
A new paper:
(Not yet posted on the Deinsea journal website)
Free pdf:
Amelia R. Zietlow, Michael J. Everhart & Michael J. Polcyn (2026)
Redescription of the holotypes of Tylosaurus proriger and Tylosaurus nepaeolicus (Squamata: Mosasauridae)
Deinsea 24: 1 - 21
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.20412622
Free pdf:
https://zenodo.org/records/20412622
Mosasaurs are a clade of extinct secondarily marine-adapted lizards whose fossils are relatively common in museum collections around the world. While mosasaurs have been studied for over 200 years, many important specimens, including holotypes, are insufficiently documented or completely absent from the scientific literature. This limits the accessibility of these specimens to the scientific community, particularly to researchers who, for many possible reasons, cannot travel to see the specimens firsthand. The mosasaur genus Tylosaurus has been the subject of many recent projects aiming to study intraspecific variation (i.e., ontogeny) in mosasaurs; however, hypotheses of intraspecific variation must be assessed in the context of confident species delimitation, which is a difficult problem in vertebrate paleontology, compounded by poor preservation or documentation of holotype specimens. This is the case for most tylosaurine species, which are poorly figured, and in the case of the type species, T. proriger, completely absent from the modern scientific literature. In this work, we redescribe and figure two important Tylosaurus holotype specimens, T. proriger and T. nepaeolicus, rediagnosing both species by comparison with over 100 tylosaurine specimens.
====
Amelia R. Zietlow, Michael J. Everhart & Michael J. Polcyn (2026)
Redescription of the holotypes of Tylosaurus proriger and Tylosaurus nepaeolicus (Squamata: Mosasauridae)
Deinsea 24: 1 - 21
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.20412622
Free pdf:
https://zenodo.org/records/20412622
Mosasaurs are a clade of extinct secondarily marine-adapted lizards whose fossils are relatively common in museum collections around the world. While mosasaurs have been studied for over 200 years, many important specimens, including holotypes, are insufficiently documented or completely absent from the scientific literature. This limits the accessibility of these specimens to the scientific community, particularly to researchers who, for many possible reasons, cannot travel to see the specimens firsthand. The mosasaur genus Tylosaurus has been the subject of many recent projects aiming to study intraspecific variation (i.e., ontogeny) in mosasaurs; however, hypotheses of intraspecific variation must be assessed in the context of confident species delimitation, which is a difficult problem in vertebrate paleontology, compounded by poor preservation or documentation of holotype specimens. This is the case for most tylosaurine species, which are poorly figured, and in the case of the type species, T. proriger, completely absent from the modern scientific literature. In this work, we redescribe and figure two important Tylosaurus holotype specimens, T. proriger and T. nepaeolicus, rediagnosing both species by comparison with over 100 tylosaurine specimens.
====
Reply all
Reply to author
Forward
0 new messages