Mosasaur

Mosasaurs (from Latin Mosa meaning the 'Meuse', and Greek σαύρος sauros meaning 'lizard') comprise a group of extinct, large marine reptiles from the Late Cretaceous. Their first fossil remains were discovered in a limestone quarry at Maastricht on the Meuse in 1764. They belong to the order Squamata, which includes lizards and snakes. Mosasaurs probably evolved from an extinct group of aquatic lizards known as aigialosaurs in the Earliest Late Cretaceous with 42 described genera. During the last 20 million years of the Cretaceous period (Turonian–Maastrichtian ages), with the extinction of the ichthyosaurs and pliosaurs, mosasaurs became the dominant marine predators. They themselves became extinct as a result of the K-Pg event at the end of the Cretaceous period, about 66 million years ago. Mosasaurs breathed air, were powerful swimmers, and were well-adapted to living in the warm, shallow inland seas prevalent during the Late Cretaceous period. Mosasaurs were so well adapted to this environment that they most likely gave birth to live young, rather than returning to the shore to lay eggs as sea turtles do. The smallest-known mosasaur was Dallasaurus turneri, which was less than long. Larger mosasaurs were more typical, with many species growing longer than . Mosasaurus hoffmannii, the largest known species reached up to , but it has been considered to be probably overestimated by Cleary et al. (2018). Currently, the largest publicly exhibited mosasaur skeleton in the world is on display at the Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre in Morden, Manitoba. The specimen, nicknamed "Bruce", is just over long, but this might be an overestimate as the skeleton was assembled for display prior to a 2010 reassessment of the species that found its original number of vertebrae to be exaggerated, implying that the actual size of the animal was likely smaller. Mosasaurs had a body shape similar to that of modern-day monitor lizards (varanids), but were more elongated and streamlined for swimming.