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World of Dinosaurs/Allosaurus

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An Allosaurus skeleton in the American Museum of Natural History.

Basics

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Allosaurus means "other lizard"

Allosuarus fragilis is the state fossil of Utah

Allosaurus lived during the Jurassic Period

Anatomy

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Allosaurus is a lanky meat-eating dinosaur.

Look for these features:

- furcula (wish bone, which is found in the theropod clade)

- smooth ankle and smooth hips

- ankle raised off the ground (found in derived theropods)

Phylogeny

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Allosaurus is a meat-eating beasty, a theropod dinosaur.

All theropods are dinosaurs.

All dinosaurs are amniotes and all dinosaurs are tetrapods.

Biomechanics

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Allosaurus have jaws that can offer a stronger bite than an alligator, but not quite as powerful as a Tyrannosaurus rex.

Fossil Record

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Visit the paleobiology database, at paleodb.org

Allosaurus fossils are relatively common in Utah, including many scattered (disarticulated) skeletons at the Cleveland Lloyd Quarry in Utah.

Ecology

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Allosaurus is a meat-eating dinosaur which co-occurred with Stegosaurus.

Ferns, shrubs, and trees would have been common, but flowering plants, fruit trees, or grass were NOT around yet!

Biogeography

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Rocks from the Jurassic period indicate hotter, wetter conditions than we experience on Earth today.

Rocks do not show signs of ice caps near the poles, of traveling ice-bergs, or other signs of "ice house" conditions.

Allosaurus would have roamed deserts and river systems. The super-continent Pangea was splitting up throughout the Jurassic Period, adding volcanic activity, particularly along the west coast, and warm, seasonally-variable habitats.