A group of paleontologists discovered matching dinosaur footprints on what at the moment are two separate continents, separated by hundreds of miles of ocean.
The footprints, courting from the Early Cretaceous interval, had been present in Brazil and Cameroon, researchers wrote in a examine printed Monday by the New Mexico Museum of Pure Historical past and Science. The analysis reveals that land-dwelling dinosaurs had been capable of freely cross between South America and Africa earlier than the 2 continents separated thousands and thousands of years in the past.
Change of land
Researchers studied greater than 260 footprints, which had been discovered impressed in mud and silt alongside historical rivers and lakes, spanning greater than 3,700 miles throughout South America and Africa, in accordance with the examine. . Paleontologists decided that they had been related in age, measurement, and geological and plate tectonic contexts.
Dinosaurs made tracks on a single 120 million years in the past super continent Generally known as Gondwana, it broke off from the big landmass of Pangea — as soon as the world’s solely continent, mentioned paleontologist Louis Jacobs of Southern Methodist College.
“One of many youngest and tightest geologic connections between Africa and South America was the northeastern Brazilian elbow that now lies alongside the Gulf of Guinea alongside the coast of Cameroon,” mentioned Jacobs, lead examine writer. , mentioned. “The 2 continents had been steady alongside that slim stretch, so animals on both aspect of that connection might probably transfer throughout it.”
The continents now often called Africa and South America started to separate about 140 million years in the past, the researchers mentioned. The South Atlantic Ocean finally crammed the void.
Basins are shaped by the separation of continents; Rivers circulate and lakes kind in these basins, Jacobs mentioned. The basins the place the footprints had been discovered will be discovered on both aspect of the cut up.
What we learn about dinosaurs
A lot of the footprints had been made by the three-toed theropods, a gaggle of carnivorous dinosaurs, the researchers mentioned. There have been additionally prints left behind by sauropods or ornithologists.
“The crops fed the herbivores and supported the meals chain,” Jacobs mentioned. “Mud sediments left by rivers and lakes comprise footprints of dinosaurs, together with meat-eaters, documenting that these river valleys served as particular routes for all times to journey throughout continents 120 million years in the past. can present.”
