Borealosaurus

Borealosaurus was a modest-sized titanosaur sauropod from the Late Cretaceous of Liaoning Province in northeast China. Named in honour of the Swedish palaeontologist Carl Wiman, it is known from isolated teeth, tail vertebrae, and a right humerus recovered from the Sunjiawan Formation. The middle tail vertebrae feature an opisthocoelous shape, where the front face of the centrum is convex and the rear is concave, a distinctive feature that helps differentiate it from many contemporary titanosaurs. As an exclusively herbivorous quadruped, Borealosaurus fed on Cretaceous vegetation using slender, pencil-like teeth. While its remains are relatively fragmentary, it provides critical insight into the radiation of titanosaurian sauropods across northern China during the early phases of the Late Cretaceous epoch.

It has opisthocoelous middle tail vertebrae, an unusual trait among titanosaurian sauropods.

Where and when

Borealosaurus lived in the Late Cretaceous, from 95 to 89 million years ago (Cenomanian-Turonian age). Its remains come from China, in the Sunjiawan Formation.

The numbers

Length 14 m (estimates run from 12 to 15 m). Mass about 9.8 t. Hip height about 3 m. That is 7.9 human-lengths, or 1.21 of a double-decker bus. These are estimates from fragmentary remains; fields marked estimated by the site are length, mass, first ma, last ma, hip height.

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