They could be throughout an ocean, however dinosaur footprints present in South America and Africa are so comparable that their discovery suggests the dinosaurs might have roamed a slim hall that related the 2 continents earlier than divide.
Researchers discovered greater than 260 footprints greater than 3,700 miles aside in Brazil and Cameroon that have been preserved in mud and silt the place historical rivers and lakes as soon as have been, in response to to a published study Monday from the New Mexico Museum of Pure Historical past and Science. The tracks have been made 120 million years in the past, when Africa and South America have been nonetheless related as a part of a supercontinent referred to as Gondwana, the researchers discovered.
In accordance with the examine, the Borborema Plateau in northeastern Brazil and the Kum Basin in northern Cameroon comprise comparable geological buildings which have preserved dinosaur footprints.
The footprints present in these areas are comparable in age, form and geological context, mentioned Dr. Louis L. Jacobs, a paleontologist at Texas Southern Methodist College and lead writer of the examine.
It isn’t shocking to make such discoveries in areas that have been as soon as related, Dr. Jacobs mentioned, however dinosaur tracks assist us perceive the geological historical past of a area that broke aside tens of millions of years in the past.
The paper reveals “a particular place at a particular time with particular climatic and environmental circumstances” that might assist present how animals might have moved throughout the stretch between Cameroon and Brazil earlier than Gondwana broke up, mentioned Dr Jacobs.
Dr Jacobs mentioned his analysis started in Cameroon within the late Nineteen Eighties, when he and a group of French and Cameroonian researchers found dinosaur bones, fossilized mammal bones and dinosaur footprints. He revisited the findings lately when the New Mexico Museum of Pure Historical past and Science wished to publish a devoted quantity of Martin Lockleypaleontologist who died in November after a profession finding out dinosaur tracks and footprints.
Dr. Jacobs labored with a global group to find out the age of the footprints he had beforehand found in Cameroon by finding out the rocks during which they have been preserved. Then they checked out data of dinosaur tracks in Brazil, the place the continents have been as soon as joined and the place Dr. Jacobs .. Jacobs knew there have been tracks.
Many of the footprints have been created by three-toed carnivorous theropods, that are often bipedal. Some are additionally made by long-necked sauropods or ornithischians, a various superfamily of herbivores, in response to Diana P. Lozeanalysis affiliate at Southern Methodist College and co-author of the examine.
“The geology began to look very comparable,” Mr Jacobs mentioned. “Even the buildings that present the continents breaking up are steady proper from Brazil to Cameroon.”
The group additionally checked out a paleogeographic mannequin of Earth that included topography and river valleys current on the time, and a local weather mannequin for 120 million years in the past. The sediments additionally comprise fossil pollen that’s about 120 million years outdated or older, in response to the paper.
Dinosaur tracks assist inform the story of our trendy world, Dr Jacobs mentioned.
“Dinosaur tracks inform you issues that bones will not,” he mentioned. “It reveals how they moved, the place they moved, whether or not they moved alone or with others. It is a completely different approach of wanting on the previous as a result of there’s completely different info contained within the prints.”
Emese Bordy, a sedimentologist on the College of Cape City who specializes within the paleoenvironments of South Gondwana and who was not concerned within the examine, mentioned in an e mail that it was not “surprising to seek out” footprints left by theropods relationship to this time interval.
“Though the presence of all these fossils at this website isn’t a surprise, the truth that they’ve been preserved in any respect stays extraordinary,” mentioned Dr Bordi. who in 2020 published a study about dozens of footprints left by dinosaurs and different creatures in present-day South Africa earlier than Gondwana broke up.
“All geological work is interconnected, and by refining the geological background of this distant space in Africa, the authors are serving to to resolve a chunk of the puzzle of African Earth historical past, contributing to our understanding of the historical past of Gondwana and finally the historical past of the Earth “, writes Dr. Bordi.
