Fossil of the “crocodile faced snake” sea monster found in the United States

A fossil of an ancient serpentine sea monster, about seven meters long, has been discovered in Wyoming, in the western United States. It is classified by scientists in the genus Serpentisuchops, which means “crocodile-faced snake” and includes a single species, called S. pfisterae, first identified in 1995.

This giant reptile inhabited the seas more than 70 million years ago, when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. It got its name because its long neck resembles a snake and its protruding jaws are similar to those of crocodiles.

“For comparison, the human neck has only seven vertebrae,” Professor Walter Scott Persons of Charleston College in South Carolina said in a statement. “Serpentisuchops is 32 years old.” Persons is the lead author of the study describing the discovery, published this week in the scientific journal iScience.

Serpentisuchops is a member of an extinct group of marine reptiles called plesiosaurs, but its unique morphology is changing what was known about this long-lost lineage.

“When I was a student, I was taught that all late evolving plesiosaurs fall into one of two anatomical categories: those with very long necks and tiny heads and those with short necks and very long jaws,” Persons said. “Well, our new animal totally confuses these categories.”

So far, scientists have identified more than 100 species of plesiosaurs, with one of the largest measuring around 15 meters in length and presumably weighing 45 tons, discovered in Norway in 2009, which has been dubbed Predator X. According to paleontologists, its bite could be four times stronger than a Tyrannosaurus rex.

According to Persons, the fossil was unearthed more than 25 years ago in eastern Wyoming and donated to the Paleon Museum in Glenrock, where it was studied. “Most of that time was spent cleaning it up and preparing it for scientific scrutiny,” Persons said in an interview with the website. Live science. “Only now has the specimen been able to reveal her secrets.”

Researchers believe these animals had a diet consisting of small, fast-swimming prey like squid and minnows. “The tall, tapering teeth are smooth and not serrated, with a pointed edge, so this animal wouldn’t have been able to bite into sturdy bones,” Persons said.

He says there is still a lot to discover about plesiosaurs. “Plesiosaurs have been distributed globally and over a long period of time. I suspect we only know a small fraction of all the plesiosaur species that have ever existed.

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Source: Olhar Digital