image: This is Brontosaurus as researchers see it today -- with a Diplodocus-like head. view more
Credit: Davide Bonadonna, Milan, Italy
Although well known as one of the most iconic dinosaurs, Brontosaurus (the 'thunder lizard') has long been considered misclassified. Since 1903, the scientific community has believed that the genus Brontosaurus was in fact the Apatosaurus. Now, an exhaustive new study by palaeontologists from Portugal and the UK provides conclusive evidence that Brontosaurus is distinct from Apatosaurus and as such can now be reinstated as its own unique genus.
Brontosaurus is one of the most charismatic dinosaurs of all time, inspiring generations of children thanks to its size and evocative name. However, as every armchair palaeontologist knows, Brontosaurus was in fact a misnomer, and it should be correctly referred to as Apatosaurus. At least, this is what scientists have believed since 1903, when it was decided that the differences between Brontosaurus excelsus and Apatosaurus were so minor that it was better to put them both in the same genus. Because Apatosaurus was named first, it was the one that was used under the rules of scientific naming.
In fact, of course, the Brontosaurus was never really gone - it was simply treated as a species of the genus Apatosaurus: Apatosaurus excelsus. So, while scientists thought the genus Brontosaurus was the same as Apatosaurus, they always agreed that the species excelsus was different from other Apatosaurus species. Now, palaeontologists Emanuel Tschopp, Octávio Mateus, and Roger Benson say that Brontosaurus was a unique genus all along. But let's start from the beginning.
The history of Brontosaurus is complex, and one of the most intriguing stories in science. In the 1870s, the Western United States formed the location for dozens of new finds of fossil species, most notably of dinosaurs. Field crews excavated numerous new skeletons mostly for the famous and influential palaeontologists Marsh and Cope. During that period, Marsh's team discovered two enormous, partial skeletons of long-necked dinosaurs and shipped them to the Yale Peabody Museum in New Haven, where Marsh worked. Marsh described the first of these skeletons as Apatosaurus ajax, the "deceptive lizard" after the Greek hero Ajax. Two years later, he named the second skeleton Brontosaurus excelsus, the "noble thunder lizard". However, because neither of the skeletons were found with a skull, Marsh reconstructed one for Brontosaurus excelsus. Brontosaurus was a massive animal, like Apatosaurus, and like another long-necked dinosaur from the Western United States, Camarasaurus. Because of this similarity, it seemed logical at the time that Brontosaurus had a similarly stout, box-like skull to that of Camarasaurus. However, this reconstruction was later found to be wrong.
Shortly after Marsh's death, a team from the Field Museum of Chicago found another skeleton similar to both Apatosaurus ajax and Brontosaurus excelsus. In fact, this skeleton was intermediate in shape in many aspects. Therefore, palaeontologists thought that Brontosaurus excelsus was actually so similar to Apatosaurus ajax that it would be more correct to treat them as two different species of the same genus. It was the second extinction of Brontosaurus - a scientific one: from now on, Brontosaurus excelsus became known as Apatosaurus excelsus and the name Brontosaurus was not considered scientifically valid any more.
The final blow to "Brontosaurus" happened in the 1970s, when researchers showed that Apatosaurus was not closely related to Camarasaurus, but to yet another dinosaur from the same area: Diplodocus. Because Diplodocus had a slender, horse-like skull, Apatosaurus and thus also "Brontosaurus" must have had a skull more similar to Diplodocus instead of to Camarasaurus - and so the popular, but untrue myth about "Brontosaurus" being an Apatosaurus with the wrong head was born.
But now, in a new study published in the peer reviewed open access journal PeerJ and consisting of almost 300 pages of evidence, a team of scientists from Portugal and the UK have shown that Brontosaurus was distinct from Apatosaurus after all - the thunder lizard is back!
How can a single study overthrow more than a century of research? "Our research would not have been possible at this level of detail 15 or more years ago", explains Emanuel Tschopp, a Swiss national who led the study during his PhD at Universidade Nova de Lisboa in Portugal, "in fact, until very recently, the claim that Brontosaurus was the same as Apatosaurus was completely reasonable, based on the knowledge we had." It is only with numerous new findings of dinosaurs similar to Apatosaurus and Brontosaurus in recent years that it has become possible to undertake a detailed reinvestigation of how different they actually were.
In science, the distinction between species and genera is without clear rules. Does this mean that the decision to resurrect Brontosaurus is just a matter of personal preference? "Not at all", explains Tschopp, "we tried to be as objective as possible whenever making a decision which would differentiate between species and genus". The researchers applied statistical approaches to calculate the differences between other species and genera of diplodocid dinosaurs, and were surprised by the result. "The differences we found between Brontosaurus and Apatosaurus were at least as numerous as the ones between other closely related genera, and much more than what you normally find between species," explained Roger Benson, a co-author from the University of Oxford.
Therefore, Tschopp and colleagues have concluded that it is now possible to resurrect Brontosaurus as a genus distinct from Apatosaurus. "It's the classic example of how science works", said Professor Mateus, a collaborator on the research. "Especially when hypotheses are based on fragmentary fossils, it is possible for new finds to overthrow years of research."
Science is a process, always moving towards a clearer picture of the world around us. Sometimes this also means that we have to step backwards a bit before we continue to advance. That's what keeps the curiosity going. Hence, it is fitting that the Brontosaurus which sparked the curiosity of millions of people worldwide has now returned to do so again.
###
Images:
Note: Full size versions of these images, plus additional images, are available here (http://goo.gl/gPqfpi)
Life restoration: "Brontosaurus as researchers see it today - with a Diplodocus-like head"
Credit: Davide Bonadonna, Milan, Italy. Creative commons license CC- BY NC SA.
Infographic: "The history of Brontosaurus - one of the greatest stories in paleontology"
License: CC BY 4.0. Designers: StudioAM
Full resolution PDFs of these infographics are available at: http://static.peerj.com/press/previews/2015/04/857_infographic_no_text.pdf and: http://static.peerj.com/press/previews/2015/04/857_infographic_with_text.pdf
Historic image: "A reconstruction of the skeleton of Brontosaurus excelsus with the wrong, Camarasaurus-like skull". Published by OC Marsh, 1896, now in public domain, available here: http://www.copyrightexpired.com/earlyimage/bones/display_marsh_brontosaurus.htm
Historic life restoration: "Brontosaurus as researchers imagined it in the late 1800s: aquatic, and with a large, robust skull". Artist unknown, image in public domain, available here: http://www.copyrightexpired.com/earlyimage/bones/large/display_daiguebelle_brontosaurus.htm
Additional images are available here: http://goo.gl/gPqfpi
EMBARGOED until April 7th 2015: 7 am EDT; 11 am UTC (i.e. the date of publication)
PDF of this Press Release: http://static.peerj.com/pressReleases/2015/PressReleasePeerJ_Tschopp.pdf
Link to the Press Preview of the Original Article (this link should only be used BEFORE the embargo ends): http://static.peerj.com/press/previews/2015/04/857.pdf (300 DPI resolution, 23Mb file). Note: this is an author proof and so may change slightly before publication.
Link to the Published Version of the article (quote this link in your story - the link will ONLY work after the embargo lifts): https://peerj.com/articles/857 - your readers will be able to freely access this article at this URL.
Citation to the article: Tschopp et al. (2015), A specimen-level phylogenetic analysis and taxonomic revision of Diplodocidae (Dinosauria, Sauropoda). PeerJ 3:e857; DOI 10.7717/peerj.857
Peer-Review Information: The article was peer reviewed by Andy Farke (the Academic Editor, of the Raymond M. Alf Museum of Paleontology), Philip Mannion (Imperial College London), and John Whitlock (Mount Aloysius College). The full peer-review history will be made available alongside the published article, and journalists may request it in advance of publication (by emailing press@peerj.com).
About PeerJ
PeerJ is an Open Access publisher of peer reviewed articles, which offers researchers a lifetime publication plan, for a single low price, providing them with the ability to openly publish all future articles for free. PeerJ is based in San Francisco, CA and London, UK and can be accessed at https://peerj.com/. PeerJ's mission is to help the world efficiently publish its knowledge.
All works published in PeerJ are Open Access and published using a Creative Commons license (CC-BY 4.0). Everything is immediately available--to read, download, redistribute, include in databases and otherwise use--without cost to anyone, anywhere, subject only to the condition that the original authors and source are properly attributed.
PeerJ has an Editorial Board of almost 1,000 respected academics, including 5 Nobel Laureates. PeerJ was the recipient of the 2013 ALPSP Award for Publishing Innovation.
PeerJ Media Resources (including logos) can be found at: https://peerj.com/about/press/
Media Contacts
Note: If you would like to join the PeerJ Press Release list, visit: http://bit.ly/PressList
For the authors: Lead author: Emanuel Tschopp, Tel: +351 91 203 83 51 (Portugal, until April 1), +39 342 631 4421 (Italy, always); tschopp.e@gmail.com (in German, English, Italian)
Collaborators: Octávio Mateus, Tel: +351 918 381 501; omateus@fct.unl.pt (in Portuguese, English) & Roger Benson, Tel: +44 (1865) 272000 (UK); roger.benson@earth.ox.ac.uk (in English)
For PeerJ: email: press@peerj.com , https://peerj.com/about/press/
External experts, who know the work and have agreed to be consulted:
Dr. Philipp Mannion (UK), +44 (0)20 7594 6404 ; philipdmannion@gmail.com
Dr. John Whitlock (USA), +1 814.886.6536 ; jwhitlock@mtaloy.edu
Dr. Paul Upchurch (UK), +44 (0) 207 679 7947 ; p.upchurch@ucl.ac.uk
Dr Mike Taylor (UK), Skype: Sauropoda ; sauropoda@gmail.com
Prof. Martin Sander (Germany), +49 228 73 31 05 ; martin.sander@uni-bonn.de
Prof. Louis Jacbos (USA) ; +1 214 768 2425; jacobs@smu.edu
Dr. Fidel Torcida (Spain) ; fideltorcida@hotmail.com
Abstract (from the article):
Diplodocidae are among the best known sauropod dinosaurs. Several species were described in the late 1800s or early 1900s from the Morrison Formation of North America. Since then, numerous additional specimens were recovered in the USA, Tanzania, Portugal, and Argentina, as well as possibly Spain, England, Georgia, Zimbabwe, and Asia. To date, the clade includes about 12 to 15 nominal species, some of them with questionable taxonomic status (e.g., 'Diplodocus' hayi or Dyslocosaurus polyonychius), and ranging in age from Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous. However, intrageneric relationships of the iconic, multi-species genera Apatosaurus and Diplodocus are still poorly known. The way to resolve this issue is a specimen-based phylogenetic analysis, which has been previously implemented for Apatosaurus, but is here performed for the first time for the entire clade of Diplodocidae. The analysis includes 81 operational taxonomic units, 49 of which belong to Diplodocidae. The set of OTUs includes all name-bearing type specimens previously proposed to belong to Diplodocidae, alongside a set of relatively complete referred specimens, that increase the amount of anatomically overlapping material. Non-diplodocid outgroups were selected to test the affinities of potential diplodocid specimens that have subsequently been suggested to belong outside the clade. The specimens were scored for 477 morphological characters, representing one of the most extensive phylogenetic analyses of sauropod dinosaurs. Character states were figured and tables given in the case of numerical characters. The resulting cladogram recovers the classical arrangement of diplodocid relationships. Two numerical approaches were used to increase reproducibility in our taxonomic delimitation of species and genera. This resulted in the proposal that some species previously included in well-known genera like Apatosaurus and Diplodocus are generically distinct. Of particular note is that the famous genus Brontosaurus is considered valid by our quantitative approach. Furthermore, "Diplodocus" hayi represents a unique genus, which will herein be called Galeamopus gen. nov. On the other hand, these numerical approaches imply synonymization of "Dinheirosaurus" from the Late Jurassic of Portugal with the Morrison Formation genus Supersaurus. Our use of a specimen-, rather than species-based approach increases knowledge of intraspecific and intrageneric variation in diplodocids, and the study demonstrates how specimen-based phylogenetic analysis is a valuable tool in sauropod taxonomy, and potentially in paleontology and taxonomy as a whole.
Journal
PeerJ