Journal
ZOOLOGICAL JOURNAL OF THE LINNEAN SOCIETY
Volume 195, Issue 1, Pages 157-171Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/zoolinnean/zlab120
Keywords
anatomy; Cretaceous; Dinosauria; osteohistology; palaeontology
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This study examines the taxonomic identity of the horned dinosaur genus Torosaurus. Based on the analysis of frill material from Canada, it is determined that Torosaurus is a valid genus and not a mature growth form of Triceratops.
The horned dinosaur genus Torosaurus has a challenging history, relating both to its geographic distribution and taxonomy. Whereas Torosaurus has been reported from Upper Maastrichtian deposits in Canada, which would mark the northernmost range of the genus, recent work has questioned the generic identity of the implicated material, which primarily consists of a pair of cranial frills. Perhaps more problematically, the validity of the genus itself has been a subject of recent debate, with some arguing that Torosaurus is simply a skeletally mature growth form of the contemporaneous Triceratops. In this study, we describe and illustrate the relevant frill material from Canada, and determine that it is most plausibly attributable to the Torosaurus morph. Moreover, we apply for the first time osteohistological sampling to some postcranial material associated with one of the frills, and find that the animal was still growing at the time of death. This finding, in addition to other considerations presented here, leads us to conclude that Torosaurus is a valid genus, and is not simply a mature growth form of Triceratops.
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