Brachiosaur

Brachiosaur belongs to the dinosaurs family of the genus Brachiosaurus. The brachiosaurus dinosaur lived on earth before 150 million to 130 million years, that is particularly during the mid to late Jurassic period and during the Early Cretaceous Period. The existing complete skeletons of brachiosaurus shows that they are the heaviest and tallest sauropod dinosaurs. The largest fossil bones belonging to other sauropods were also found in this world, but these specimens remain incomplete. The long neck dinosaur name brachiosaur fossilized are discovered and found from Africa, Europe, and North America. 

The physical characteristics of the Brachiosaurs are similar to the huge giraffes. Brachiosaurus had immensely long necks and relatively short tails. The morphological characteristics of the brachiosaurus are unusual among the dinosaurs family. They have longer forelimbs while compared to the hind limbs. These adaptations help them to lift their heads by about 12 meters from the ground level, also these facilitate them to take enough from the branches of tall trees. Brachiosaurus height was reached about 25 metres and the maximum brachiosaurus weight recorded was about 80 metric tons. 

The expanded nasal bones were under the broad arch that presumably allowed them to maintain few distances between the vegetation. Further, the expanded nasal bones with nasal openings also facilitated then for breathe easily while intaking feeds. The mouth of the brachiosaur had a few dozen pencil-like teeth with bevelled edges. Like other species in the dinosaurs family, brachiosaurs cannot chew their food but, they used their jaws to collect food further, their tongue presumably forced into the throat. Brachiosaurus size is massive but, they have small heads so, they considerably intake poor quality of foods. Also, researchers found that the brachiosaur found most of their life in walking for searching feeds. 

Some researchers also analysed the existing fossil bones and suggested that they spent maximum live time submerged under the water, which would have an anchored float serving as a navigation mark up for their great weight. However, the location of the nasal opening present on the top of the head above their eyes are providing additional support for submerging under the water. But, the pressure of water at the depths requires to cover these dinosaurs, which may have crushed their lungs and thus they may cause difficulty during the breath.  

The other features of the brachiosaurus skeletons show that they were well adapted to a life spent on land browsing the huge treetops. The skeletons of the brachiosaurus were strong but they were not massive. So, their brachiosaurus weight could be supported without any help even under the water. Their long neck dinosaur name brachiosaur had great neck bones. 

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Characteristics of Brachiosaur 

Physical Appearance of Brachiosaur

The brachiosaurus was the quadruped animal, they used all four limbs for their locomotion and they have a long neck, small skull, columnar limbs, a large trunk with a high-ellipsoid cross-section with a long muscular tail and slender. The lungs of the brachiosaurus dinosaurs were connected with large air sacs, which were present in the extension of the neck and truck. The air sacs are invading the vertebrae and ribs of bone resorption and greatly minimize the overall density of the body. The neck of the brachiosaur was not preserved by the holotype specimen, but they were very long by sauropod standards in the closely related Giraffatitan, further they consist of thirteen elongated neck vertebrae. The neck of the brachiosaur looks like a slight S-curve with the upper and lower sections bent and a straight middle section. Brachiosaurus had some similarities with Giraffatitan like, very elongated neck ribs, which ran down under the neck, overlapping several preceding vertebrae. The body rods attached with the neck muscles at the end of the neck allows the muscles to operate distal portions of the neck while located closer the bone rods are located in the trunk, lightening the distal neck portions.

Both the Brachiosaurus and Giraffatitan had a small shoulder hump, which is present between the third and fifth dorsal vertebra of the species. Further, the sideward and upward vertebral processes were longer and they are providing an additional surface for neck muscle attachment. The ribcage of the brachiosaur was deep compared to other sauropods. Though the upper arm bone and thigh bone of brachiosaurus dinosaur were roughly equal in length, and the entire forelimb was longer than the hindlimb, as the hindlimb can be inferred from the elongated metacarpus and forearm of other brachiosaurids. The inclined trunk with the shoulder of the brachiosaur was much higher than the hips and the neck exiting the trunk at a steep angle. The entire external appearance of Brachiosaurus resembles the same as giraffe and other dinosaur species. But the sauropods had a  shorter forelimb and longer hindlimbs. The forelimbs are also short in contemporaneous diplodocids

Brachiosaurus also had some difference in body characteristics of Giraffatitan. The trunk of the Brachiosaurus was about 25 - 30% longer than the Giraffatitan, further, the dorsal vertebral column was longer than the humerus. Only a single complete caudal (tail) vertebra has been found in the brachiosaur. Later researchers discovered that the tail was larger than in Giraffatitan. The size of the tail is brachiosaur vertebra had greater area due to broadened neutral spine and compatible 20 - 25% larger than the  Giraffatitan. 

Nasal Function in Brachiosaur 

The bony nasal openings of the Brachiosaurus was large and they were placed on the top of their skulls. The fleshy nostrils present in the brachiosaur were thought to have been placed likewise on top of the head, roughly at the rear of the bony nostril opening, because these animals were erroneously thought to have been amphibious, using their large nasal openings as snorkels when submerged. The brachiosaurid nose has a peculiar function as Czerkas speculated. After pointing out the characteristics, the researchers could not conclude the exact location of nostrils in the head. Further researches found that the expanded nasal opening may be made up of room for tissue related to the brachiosaur ability to smell, through that they would have helped for smell proper vegetation. 

Metabolism

The brachiosaurus was also a homeothermic and endothermic species like other sauropods. This means they could maintain a stable internal temperature and have controlled body temperature through internal means. While the brachiosaurus was in the growing stage, they required actively controlled body temperature to support the high basic metabolic rate of their cells.

Feed and Diet Plan of Brachiosaur

The Brachiosaurus is named for searching foods and were foliage well above the ground. Mostly they feed on foliage above 5 meters. The brachiosaurus height of head may remain at 9 meters above the ground, so they acquire their food from 6 - 9 meters in length. They also get their feed from the source between 3 to 5 meters. Brachiosaurus dinosaur diets were the inclusion of tree ferns, conifers, ginkgos, and large cycads. As per the study, brachiosaur approximately intakes 200 to 400 kilograms of plant matter per day. They usually feed their food through simple up-and-down jaw motion. But the other species like sauropods would swallow the plant matters without further oral processing because they are completely dependent on hindgut fermentation for food processing. Further, the teeth of sauropods are not in a spoon shape. Their cone-chisel type teeth and the precision-shear bite was employed. Such a teeth structure are suitable for non-selective nipping and the relatively broad jaws supported them for swallowing a large number of plant materials. Even the brachiosaurus weight is about forty tonnes, they required half a tonne of fodder, they could not meet the actual required dietary because of the normal cropping action of the head. If the brachiosaurus dinosaur feed for sixteen hours per day, they bit off between a tenth and two-thirds of a kilogram, approximately, they take about one to six bites per minute, on a daily basis their food intake would have equalled roughly 1.5% of its body mass, which can be compared to the requirement of a modern elephant.

The long neck dinosaur name Brachiosaurus shared their habitat with the Morrison, and with many other sauropod species. So, they are specialised for intaking their feed from greater heights further that would have become part of a system of niche partitioning and various other characteristics are avoided other direct competition with the other species of the dinosaurs. Further Brachiosaurus had shorter arms with a lower shoulder, So that was not as well-adapted to high-browsing as Giraffatitan. 

Researchers also found that the Brachiosaurus could get support from their tails for hind legs to search for feeds. The detailed physical appearance based analysis of sauropod rearing capabilities by Heinrich Mallison showed that many sauropods were rear and the unusual body shape and limb length ratio of brachiosaurids made them exceptionally not suited for rearing. 

The forward position of the brachiosaur’s centre of mass would create problems with their stability so, they required unreasonably large forces near their hips to obtain an upright posture. While compared to other sauropods, the Brachiosaurus had gained only 33% more feeding height. The Brachiosaurus dinosaurs would adopt a bipedal stance in some situations like male-dominant fights. 

Brachiosaurus allows the downward mobility of the neck, through that they can reach open water till the level of their feet even while standing upright. Meanwhile, the Brachiosaurus could have attained a stable posture in their way, by forcing the animal to plunge the snout almost vertically into the surface of a lake or stream.  But the modern giraffes will spread their forelimbs near the lower of the mouth in a relatively horizontal position, for more easily gulp down the water.  Sometimes, the Brachiosaurus would have submerged their fleshy nostrils if they were located at the tip of the snout as Witmer hypothesized. So, researchers suggested that the nostrils might have evolved during later days and retracted position to allow the animal to breathe while drinking.

Growth of Brachiosaur 

The researchers from Carballido and colleagues have done the ontogeny of Brachiosaurus. They analysed the postcranial skeleton of a young juvenile and estimated the total body length was about 2 meters. Further, the skeletons of Brachiosaur had shared some unique traits with the B. altithorax holotype, Which indicated the type of species. The unique traits include an elevation on the rear blade of the ilium, vertical neural spines on the back, the lack of a postspinal lamina, an ilium with a subtle notch between the appendage for the ischium and the rear blade, and the lack of a side bulge on the upper thighbone. Sauropods may be involved in sexual reproduce before they attained their maximum individual size. The maturation rate differed between species. The bone structure of the Brachiosaurus indicated that they could move for reproduction when they reached 40% of their maximum size.