Dinosaurs Held Heads High After All, According to WesternU Scientist Matt Wedel

POMONA, CA, May 27 (MARKET WIRE) --
Famous depictions of the largest of all known dinosaurs, from film and
television to museum skeletons, have almost certainly got it wrong,
according to scientists at the University of Portsmouth and Western
University of Health Sciences.

Sauropods are the most iconic of prehistoric creatures. They were up to 30
metres long, weighed as much as 10 elephants, and are instantly
recognisable by their very long necks and small heads. They are the
centrepieces in most natural history museums.

Recent depictions such as the BBC's "Walking With Dinosaurs" show
sauropods with their necks horizontal and their heads near the ground.
But now scientists say the low-necked pose is a mistake: new evidence
indicates that they held their necks aloft like giraffes and all other
living land vertebrates, making them up to 15 metres tall.

Dr. Mike Taylor and Dr. Darren Naish, of the University of Portsmouth, UK,
and Dr. Matt Wedel, of Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona,
Calif., argue that while sauropods could hold their necks low, it was not
their habitual posture.

They studied X-rays of members of 10 different vertebrate groups and found
that the neck is gently inclined in salamanders, turtles, lizards and
crocodilians, it nearly vertical in mammals and birds -- the only modern
groups that share the upright leg posture of dinosaurs.

"Like the animals with us today, they would have spent most of their time
with their necks elevated, except when drinking or browsing at low
levels," Dr. Taylor said.

Modern vertebrates, from cats and humans to sauropods' closest living
relatives, the birds, hold their necks aloft in a vertical or
near-vertical position.

"We can't just study fossil bones by themselves," Dr. Wedel said.
"Dinosaurs were living animals and to understand how they lived, we need
to look at animals that are alive today. In this case, our evidence shows
the present is the key to the past."

The neck vertebrae of sauropods fit together mainly by way of ball and
socket joints. In addition, the top part of each vertebra has a pair of
facets, two at the front and two at the back, which glide past each other
when the neck bends.

"Scientists have assumed that each pair of facets must overlap by at
least 50 percent at all times; but in ostriches and giraffes the facets
can slide much further, until they hardly overlap at all," Dr. Taylor
said. "This means that sauropods would have had a far greater range of
neck movement than previously thought.

"Unless sauropods carried their heads and necks differently from every
living vertebrate, we have to assume that the base of their neck was
curved strongly upwards. In some sauropods this would have given the neck
a graceful swan-like S-curve, which would look quite different from the
recreations we are used to seeing."

Low necked poses for sauropods have been used for countless plastic toys
and have become part of mainstream culture, thanks in part to the BBC's
"Walking with Dinosaurs," and to new museum exhibits such as one at the
American Museum of Natural History in New York.

"It's hugely important to understand how sauropod dinosaurs functioned,"
said Professor Mike Benton at Bristol University's Department of Earth
Sciences. "They were so huge -- 10 times the size of an elephant -- and
yet they were successful animals. This new work provides plausible
evidence that sauropods held their necks elevated, rather than
horizontally, as had been assumed.

"The new work is based on studies of living animals, but the next step
will be to carry out engineering studies to see whether the new or old
neck positions are energetically more efficient. If you have a long neck
that weighs a tonne or more you must hold it in a neutral position where
stresses and strains are minimised."

The research was published in Acta Palaeontologica Polonica and will be
available for download beginning May 27 at http://www.app.pan.pl

PICTURES:

-- Artist's impression of a sauropod herd with the correct neck posture.
Please credit: Mark Witton
-- A correct (neck aloft) reconstruction of the sauropod Brachiosaurus in
the Humboldt Museum fuer Naturkunde, Berlin (with Dr. Mike Taylor standing,
for scale, by its left elbow). Please credit: 'Museum fuer Naturkunde
Berlin.'
-- Three line illustrations of the correct neck position of a sauropod by
the report authors. No credit required.
-- These and other images are available from the author's Web pages at:
-- http://www.miketaylor.org.uk/dino/neck-posture/

NOTE TO EDITORS:

Dr. Mike Taylor is available for interviews in the U.K. Dr. Matt Wedel is
available for interviews in the U.S. Please contact the appropriate press
office.

About Western University of Health Sciences

Western University of Health Sciences (www.westernu.edu), located in
Pomona, Calif., is an independent nonprofit health professions university,
conferring degrees in health sciences, nursing, osteopathic medicine,
pharmacy, physical therapy, physician assistant studies and veterinary
medicine. In 2009, the university will admit students to new degree
programs in dentistry, optometry, podiatry and biomedical sciences.

Media contacts:
Western University of Health Sciences Public Affairs
Jeff Malet
(909) 706-3790
jmalet@westernu.edu

University of Portsmouth Press Office
Kate Daniell
Tel: 023 92 843 743
E-mail: kate.daniell@port.ac.uk

Copyright 2009, Market Wire, All rights reserved.

-0-