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Mosasaurus fossils have been found in North and South America, Europe, Africa, Western Asia, and Antarctica. This distribution encompassed a wide range of oceanic climates including tropical, subtropical, temperate, and subpolar. Mosasaurus was a common large predator in these oceans and was positioned at the top of the food chain.
A skeleton of Tylosaurus proriger from South Dakota included remains of the diving seabird Hesperornis, a marine bony fish, a possible shark, and another, smaller mosasaur (Clidastes). Mosasaur bones have also been found with shark teeth embedded in them.
The genus contains a single species, J. walhallaensis, known from a nearly-complete skull and partial skeleton. Jormungandr was a medium-sized mosasaur, at around 6–8 metres (20–26 ft) long, and its skeletal anatomy exhibits a mix of features seen in both basal and derived mosasaurines.
Some mosasaurs measured just a few feet long, while the largest — in the genus Mosasaurus — was nearly 60 feet (18.2 meters) long, and while mosasaur fossils are relatively plentiful ...
Reconstructed skeleton of M. hoffmannii at the Maastricht Natural History Museum. The research history of Mosasaurus is extensive given its complicated taxonomic and cultural histories, with the earliest recorded fossil find dating back 1764 in a chalk quarry located near Maastricht, Netherlands.
Among them, he describes a mosasaur taxon under the name Mosasaurus cf. anceps, based on numerous fossil teeth of different morphologies. [2]: 279–282 It is now accepted that the smaller, slender teeth formerly referred to this taxon actually belong to Eremiasaurus, while the larger ones would likely have belonged to Thalassotitan.
Bell proposed that the Mosasaurini should be abandoned and that all members of the tribe should be incorporated into the Plotosaurini. While other scientists agree that a tribe containing Mosasaurus should be monophyletic, they argue that Mosasaurini should be the valid tribe. For example, in a 2012 study, Aaron LeBlanc, Caldwell, and Bardet ...
Skeleton of Clidastes liodontus mounted as if pursuing a fossil sea turtle. Russell (1967, pp. 123–124) [6] defined the Mosasaurinae as differing from all other mosasaurs as follows: "Small rostrum present or absent anterior to premaxillary teeth. Fourteen or more teeth present in dentary and maxilla. Cranial nerves X, XI, and XII leave ...