ArticleRoyal Society open science2016
Temporal and phylogenetic evolution of the sauropod dinosaur body plan.
Article in Royal Society open science, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 34 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
34 citing papers in PubMed, 93 citations in OpenAlex.
- An unusual titanosaur axis from the Upper Cretaceous of Brazil and its significance for sauropod anatomy and systematics.Anatomical record (Hoboken, N.J. : 2007) · 2026Article
- Built for bulk: posture, microanatomy and soft tissue shaped gigantism in Sauropoda.Royal Society open science · 2026Article
- Computed tomography reveals multiple origins of extreme caudal vertebral pneumaticity in sauropod dinosaurs.Journal of anatomy · 2026Article
- New perspectives on head and neck allometry and ecomorphology in tetrapods.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2026Review
- A new mamenchisaurid sauropod dinosaur from the upper jurassic of Southwest China reveals new evolutionary evidence from East Asian eusauropods.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- New perspectives on body size and shape evolution in dinosaurs.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2025Review
- Limb bone robusticity is coupled with mass distribution in terrestrial tetrapods.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
- Article
- A new mamenchisaurid from the Upper Jurassic Suining Formation of the Sichuan Basin in China and its implication on sauropod gigantism.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- When the lung invades: a review of avian postcranial skeletal pneumaticity.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2025Review
- Reconstructing dinosaur locomotion.Biology letters · 2025Review
- Article
- Morphological evolution and functional consequences of giantism in tyrannosauroid dinosaurs.iScience · 2024Article
- Testing the form-function paradigm: body shape correlates with kinematics but not energetics in selectively-bred birds.Communications biology · 2024Article
- Unraveling sauropod diversity in the Portezuelo Formation of Patagonia through a comprehensive analysis of new and existing material.BMC ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- Volumetric versus Element-scaling Mass Estimation and Its Application to Permo-Triassic Tetrapods.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2024Article
- Decoupling body shape and mass distribution in birds and their dinosaurian ancestors.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Article
- Article
- Body size, shape and ecology in tetrapods.Nature communications · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
10 authors at 10 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The colossal size and body plan of sauropod dinosaurs are unparalleled in terrestrial vertebrates. However, to date, there have been only limited attempts to examine temporal and phylogenetic patterns in the sauropod bauplan. Here, we combine three-dimensional computational models with phylogenetic reconstructions to quantify the evolution of whole-body shape and body segment properties across the sauropod radiation. Limitations associated with the absence of soft tissue preservation in fossils result in large error bars about mean absolute body shape predictions. However, applying any consistent skeleton : body volume ratio to all taxa does yield changes in body shape that appear concurrent with major macroevolutionary events in sauropod history. A caudad shift in centre-of-mass (CoM) in Middle Triassic Saurischia, associated with the evolution of bipedalism in various dinosaur lineages, was reversed in Late Triassic sauropodomorphs. A craniad CoM shift coincided with the evolution of quadrupedalism in the Late Triassic, followed by a more striking craniad shift in Late Jurassic-Cretaceous titanosauriforms, which included the largest sauropods. These craniad CoM shifts are strongly correlated with neck enlargement, a key innovation in sauropod evolution and pivotal to their gigantism. By creating a much larger feeding envelope, neck elongation is thought to have increased feeding efficiency and opened up trophic niches that were inaccessible to other herbivores. However, we find that relative neck size and CoM position are not strongly correlated with inferred feeding habits. Instead the craniad CoM positions of titanosauriforms appear closely linked with locomotion and environmental distributions, potentially contributing to the continued success of this group until the end-Cretaceous, with all other sauropods having gone extinct by the early Late Cretaceous.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.