Glossary BRO - BYR
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BRONTOSAURUS
(pronounced BRON-to-SAWR-us) Brontosaurus (meaning: "thunder lizard")
is an obsolete name for Apatosaurus, a huge sauropod from the Jurassic
Period.
BRONTOTHERE
The brontotheres (also known as titanotheres) are extinct family of large,
rhinoceros-like mammals that were ancestors of the horse, rhinoceros,
and tapir. Brontotheres had horn-like structures on their snout; bony
knobs protruded from their skull and were covered with thick skin. Males
had larger knobs than females. These herbivores ate soft forest vegetation
and were up to 8 feet (2.5 m) tall at the shoulder. Brontotheres each
had a tiny brain, only as big as a fist. They had four-hoofed toes on
each front foot and three-hoofed toes on each rear foot. They lived from
the early Eocene until the middle Oligocene (from 58-30 million years
ago). Some titanotheres include Brontops (8 ft tall, from North America),
Brontotherium (8 ft tall, from North America), Dolichorhinus (4 ft tall,
from North America), Eotitanops (1.5 ft tall, from North America and Asia),
and Embolotherium (8 ft tall, from Mongolia).
BRONTOTHERIUM
Brontotherium (meaning: "thunder beast") is an extinct, hoofed,
rhinoceros-like mammal ( a brontothere, not a dinosaur). This large animal
had a Y-shaped horn on its head. It was about 16 ft (5 m) long, 8 ft (2.4
m) high at the shoulder and weighed about 5 tons (4.5 tonne). It had a
bulky body, four sturdy legs, and thick skin. This odd-toed ungulate (perissodactyl)
ate soft leaves and grass which it chewed with its wide, flat cheek teeth.
It roamed the plains of North America in large herds during the late Eocene
and Early Oligocene epochs (about 30-45 million years ago). It is classified
as a Brontothere (titanothere), a group of huge mammals that had four
hoofed toes on each front foot and three hoofed toes on each rear foot.
These animals were extensively researched by paleontologist Henry F. Osborn.
BROWSER
A browser is an animal that eats tall foliage (leaves or trees and shrubs).
Many sauropod dinosaurs, like Brachiosaurus and Ultrasauros, were browsers.
Browsers generally don't kill the plant they eat.
BROWN, BARNUM
Barnum Brown (1873-1963) was a great US dinosaur hunter and assistant
curator of the American Museum of Natural History. Brown discovered many
dinosaurs, including the first Tyrannosaurus rex specimens. He named:
Anchiceratops (1914), Ankylosaurus (1908), Corythosaurus (1914), Hypacrosaurus
(1913), Kritosaurus (1910), Leptoceratops (1914), Prosaurolophus (1916),
Saurolophus (1912), and the family Ankylosauridae (1908). He co-named
Pachycephalosaurus (1943) and Dromaeosaurus (1922) with E. M. Schlaikjer.
BRUHATHKAYOSAURUS
(pronounced bruh-HUT-kah-yo-SAWR-us) Bruhathkayosaurus (meaning: "heavy-body
lizard") was a titanosaurid sauropod dinosaur from the late Cretaceous
Period, about 70 million years ago. An incomplete fossil was found in
India. This long-necked, long-tailed plant-eater was enormous, perhaps
up to 130 ft (40 m) long. Bruhathkayosaurus was named by Yadagiri and
Ayyasami in 1989. The type species is B. matleyi. Bruhathkayosaurus was
originally classified as a theropod, but is now believed to be a titanosaurid
sauropod (mostly becasue of the enormous size of the femur -2.34 meters
long).
BRYOZOAN
Bryozoans (meaning: "moss life") are a phylum of small invertebrate
animals that live in salt water (or occasionally in fresh or brackish
water) and are also called moss animals or sea mats. Bryozoans live in
colonies of many polyps. They have ciliated tentacles and a hard, box-like,
calcium carbonate skeleton. Bryozoans date from the Early Ordovician,
roughly 400 million years ago. Fossil bryozoans are abundant and are important
in the rock-forming process. Archimedes was a ancient corkscrew-shaped
bryozoan.
BUCKLAND, WILLIAM
William Buckland (1784-1856) was a British fossil hunter, clergyman, and
Oxford don (a Reader in Geology and Mineralogy) who discovered Megalosaurus
in 1819 and named it in 1824. It was the first dinosaur ever described
scientifically and the first theropod dinosaur discovered. He always collected
his fossils in a large blue bag, which he carried around most of the time.
BUGENASAURA
(pronounced BOO-gene-ah-SAWR-ah) Bugenasaura (meaning: "large-cheek
lizard") was an ornithopod (a plant-eating dinosaur) from the late
Cretaceous Period. Partial fossils were found in South Dakota, USA. It
was named by paleontologist Galton in 1995. The type species is B. infernalis.
Bugenasaura may be the same as Thescelosaurus or the pachycephalosaur
Stygimoloch spinifer.
BULLATOSAURIA
(pronounced buh-LAH-toh-SAWR-ee-ah) Bullatosauria (meaning: "inflated
lizard") were a group of advanced theropods (bipedal, intelligent,
meat-eating dinosaurs) from the late Cretaceous Period. Bullatosaurs include
Troödontids and Ornithomimids.
BURGESS SHALE
The Burgess shale is an incredibly fossil-rich area in the Canadian Rocky
Mountains (in British Columbia). This Lagerstatten (a geological fossil
deposit rich with varied, well-preserved fossils) is replete with fossils
from the Cambrian Period, roughly 500 million years old. The Burgess shale
was discovered in 1909 by Charles Doolittle Wolcott, who was the Secretary
of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. at the time. Fossils
from this area include early representatives of most modern groups, including
worms, sponges, shrimp-like crustaceans, and jellyfish.
Butterfly
A type of insect. Butterflies, along with moths and skippers are insects
classified as Lepidoptera. Today there are several thousand species distributed
world-wide. They evolved in the Cretaceous period alongside the flowering
plants which they fed on, and pollinated in return. They were the most
recent major group of insects to have evolved.
BYA
"bya" is an abbreviation for billions of years ago.
BYRONOSAURUS
Byronosaurus was a Troödontid dinosaur, a small, very smart, meat-eating
theropod dinosaur from the late Cretaceous period, about 76 to 70 million
years ago. It was about 5 feet (1.5 m) long. It is the first troodontid
that had unserrated teeth. Fossils have been found in Mongolia. Byronosaurus
was named by Norell, Mackovicky, and Clark in 2000. The type species is
B. jaffei.