Pneumatoarthrus is an extinct genus of sea turtle known from the Late Cretaceous (early Maastrichtian) Mount Laurel Formation of Monmouth County, New Jersey.[1][2] Only a single species, P. peloreus, is known.[1][2]
Pneumatoarthrus Temporal range: Late Cretaceous,
| |
---|---|
Holotype vertebra ANSP 9225 seen from three different angles | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Reptilia |
Order: | Testudines |
Suborder: | Cryptodira |
Family: | †Protostegidae |
Genus: | †Pneumatoarthrus Cope, 1870 |
Species: | †P. peloreus
|
Binomial name | |
†Pneumatoarthrus peloreus Cope, 1870
|
The holotype of Pneumatoarthrus, ANSP 9225, was originally identified as a sacrum belonging to Hadrosaurus by Joseph Leidy in an 1865 monograph on Cretaceous reptiles from the US.[1] Edward Drinker Cope later identified it belonging to a dinosaur more closely related to Anchisaurus, Efraasia, and Clepsysaurus than to Dryptosaurus and Ornithopsis,[2] and in his 1872 description of the sea turtle Protostega he decided that Pneumatoarthrus was likely a sea turtle as well, which he reiterated in his 1875 monograph on Cretaceous vertebrate fossils from the Western Interior.[3][4] Later authors overlooked Cope's 1875 monograph and considered it either a theropod or a hadrosaur (Huene 1932 considered Pneumatoarthrus the sacral vertebrae of Dryptosaurus).[5] Baird (1979) confirmed the protostegid identification of Pneumatoarthrus by Cope (1872, 1875) based on examination of ANSP 9225.[6]