Acrocanthosaurus



Acrocanthosaurus was a huge carnivore that lived in the North America during the Early Cretaceous. Its fossils are found mainly in Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.

Acrocanthosaurus was a bipedal killing machine. It was one of the largest theropod of all time, aproaching 12 meters in length, and weighing 4.5 tons. It was large, fast and fierce.

Acrocanthosaurus was slightly smaller than enormous Giganosaurus. Its skull was 1.4 meters long. It was long, low and narrow. Nineteen curved, serrated teeth were dangerous weapon. This is a characteristic feature of all allosauroids.

The most notable feature of Acrocanthosaurus was its row of tall neural spines, located on the vertebrae of the neck, back, hips and upper tail, which could be more than 2.5 times the height of the vertebrae from which they extended. Other dinosaurs also had high spines on the back, sometimes much higher than those of Acrocanthosaurus. For instance, the unrelated Spinosaurus had spines nearly 2 meters (6.5 ft) tall, about 11 times taller than the bodies of its vertebrae. Rather than supporting a skin 'sail' as seen in Spinosaurus, the lower spines of Acrocanthosaurus had attachments for powerful muscles like those of modern bison, probably forming a tall, thick ridge down its back. 


The function of the spines remains unknown, although they may have been involved in communication, fat storage, or temperature control. All of its cervical (neck) and dorsal (back) vertebrae had prominent depressions (pleurocoels) on the sides, while the caudal (tail) vertebrae bore smaller ones. This is more similar to carcharodontosaurids than to Allosaurus. 


Potential prey was Paluxysaurus or possibly even the huge Sauroposeidon who reached 50 meters long. Also, large ornithopods like Tenotosaurus was prey for this carnivore.