Russian scientists Alexander Averyanov (St. Petersburg State University and the Paleontological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences) and Vladimir Efimov (Undorovsky Paleontological Museum) described the Volgatitan simbirskiensis, which, according to scientists, is a new species of dinosaur. The study was published in the journal Biological Communications and is briefly reported by the university.
“In the early 1990s, Vladimir Mikhailovich showed photographs of the bones to the famous Leningrad paleontologist Lev Alexandrovich Nesov,” said Averyanov. - Lev Alexandrovich suggested that the vertebrae belong to the giant herbivorous dinosaurs - sauropods. In 1997, Vladimir Efimov published a preliminary note about this find in the Paleontological Journal, in which he attributed the vertebrae to the sauropod of the Brachiosauridae family. Last July, I finally managed to visit Undory and study the bones, and also managed to determine their belonging to the new taxon of titanosaurs."
In total, seven titanosaur vertebrae have been found that have lain in the earth for about 130 million years. The remains of the animal were found on the banks of the Volga, not far from the village of Slantsevy Rudnik, located five kilometers from Ulyanovsk. During life, the animal weighed, as scientists believe, about 17 tons.
“Previously, it was believed that the evolution of titanosaurs took place mainly in South America, and only in the Late Cretaceous did some taxa penetrate into North America, Europe and Asia,” explained Averyanov. - In Asia, the Early Cretaceous was dominated by representatives of a wider group - titanosauriforms, like the recently described Siberotitan. However, the recent description of the Tengrisaurus from the Early Cretaceous of Transbaikalia and the discovery of Volgatitan indicate that titanosaurs in the Early Cretaceous were much more widespread and, possibly, important stages of their evolution took place in Eastern Europe and Asia”.
Volgatitan joined the group of sauropods (Sauropoda), which are giant herbivorous dinosaurs with a long neck and tail.
Dinosaurs lived on Earth from the Triassic period (about 225 million years ago) to the end of the Cretaceous period (about 65 million years ago). Paleontologists do not yet know the exact number of dinosaur species. Some experts state that the found animal fragments, belonging to different geological stages, may belong to the same animals. In particular, experts are of the opinion that it is necessary to remove a third of dinosaur species (since the same representatives of animals are found, but of different ages) and to revise the existing classification (which will lead to a reduction of the number of dinosaur species to half).