Amargasaurus
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The Amargasaurus ("Amarga Lizard", formally Amargasaurus cazaui) was a sauropod dinosaur of the early Cretaceous period (120–130 million years before the present). Its fossil remains were found by paleontologist José Bonaparte in 1991, in a canyon in La Amarga, a town in Template:Province, about 70 km from Zapala.
The Amargasaurus was a herbivore which measured 10 m long and weighed about 5,000 kg. It was differenciated from other sauropods by two parallel rows of large "spikes" that run along its neck. These are in fact elongated cervical vertebrae or "neural spines". They may have been connected by a skin membrane, forming a double "sail".
The species name cazaui is due to Dr. Luis Cazau, a geologist who worked for the state oil company YPF. In 1983 Cazau raised the interest of Bonaparte's team in La Amarga, which turned out to be a major archaeological site.
According to Bonaparte's research, Amargasaurus is a close relative of two late Jurassic species of genus Dicraeosaurus found in Tanzania, Eastern Africa, which lived about 10 million years before. Dicraeosaurus had forked neural spines all along its neck and back.