| Tylosaurus Temporal range:Upper Cretaceous86.5–75 mya | |
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| "Bruce"T. pembinensis restoration | |
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| Subfamily: | Tylosaurinae Williston, 1895[1] |
| Genus: | Tylosaurus Cope, 1872 |
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Tylosaurus was anUpper Cretaceousmosasaur. It was a large, predatory marinelizard closely related to modernmonitor lizards and tosnakes.
In 1918, Charles H. Sternberg found aTylosaurus with the remains of aplesiosaur in its stomach.[2] The specimen is mounted in the United States National Museum (Smithsonian). The plesiosaur remains are stored in the collections.
Although these important specimens were briefly reported by C.H. Sternberg in 1922, the information was lost to science until 2001. The specimen was rediscovered and described by Everhart. It is the basis for the story line in the new (2007) National Geographic IMAX movie -Sea Monsters.[3]