The biomechanical significance of bifurcated cervical ribs in apatosaurine sauropods

Abstract

Bifurcated cervical ribs have evolved infrequently in dinosaurs. Previously documented examples include those in abelisaurid theropods, leptoceratopsid ceratopsians, and turiasaurian sauropods. In apatosaurine sauropods a spectrum of cervical rib morphologies exists, from cervical ribs with small dorsal processes extending from the shafts to completely bifurcated cervical ribs. Similar dorsal processes are present in the dicraeosaurid Dicraeosaurus. The presence of dorsal processes and bifurcated cervical ribs suggests that the hypaxial neck muscles that inserted on the cervical ribs were oriented in divergent directions. In all the dinosaurian examples we have found, the cervical ribs are maximally bifurcated in the middle of the cervical series. We hypothesize that bifurcated cervical ribs are traces of diverging neck muscles that provided improved control in the middle of the neck, at some distance from both the head and the trunk.