biology

Kamuysaurus

Kamuysaurus is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Kamuysaurus rather than just read about it. In short: Kamuysaurus is a genus of herbivorous edmontosaurin saurolophine hadrosaurid dinosaur from Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) marine deposits of the Yezo Group (Hakobuchi Formation) in the Hobetsu area near the town of Mukawa, Hokkaido in Japan. Discovery In 2003, amateur paleontologist Yoshiyuki Horita at the Shirafunezawa Creek discovered the tail of a euornithopod.

Key takeaways

Kamuysaurus belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Kamuysaurus to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Kamuysaurus from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Kamuysaurus is a genus of herbivorous edmontosaurin saurolophine hadrosaurid dinosaur from Late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) marine deposits of the Yezo Group (Hakobuchi Formation) in the Hobetsu area near the town of Mukawa, Hokkaido in Japan.

Discovery In 2003, amateur paleontologist Yoshiyuki Horita at the Shirafunezawa Creek discovered the tail of a euornithopod. An entire skeleton was in 2013 and 2014 uncovered by teams of the Hobetsu Museum and the Hokkaido University Museum. The find was nicknamed Mukawaryu, the "Dragon of Mukawa". In 2019, the type species Kamuysaurus japonicus was named and described by Professor Yoshitsugu Kobayashi, Tomohiro Nishimura, Ryuji Takasaki, Kentaro Chiba, Anthony Ricardo Fiorillo, Kohei Tanaka, Tsogtbaatar Chinzorig, Tamaki Sato and Kazuhiko Sakurai. The generic name is derived from kamuy, meaning "deity" in Ainu, the language of the original inhabitants of Hokkaido. The specific name japonicus, "japanese" in Neo-Latin, refers to the provenance from Japan. The holotype, HMG-1219, has been found in a marine layer of the Hakobuchi Formation, part of the Yezo Group, dating from the early Maastrichtian, between 72.1 and 70.6 million years old. It consists of a nearly complete skeleton with skull, only missing the snout, parts of the sacral vertebrae and phalanges. Containing over 60% of the skeletal elements and 80% of the bone mass, it is, together with the smaller skeleton of Fukuivenator, one of the most complete dinosaur skeletons found in Japan. The bones were found on a surface of seven by four metres (23 by 13 ft) and were partially articulated, though sometimes damaged by erosion. The holotype represents an adult individual of at least nine years of age. It was likely washed into the sea as a carcass.

Description

Kamuysaurus was about eight metres (26 ft) long. From the width of its thighbone, its weight has been estimated at 4 or 5.3 tonnes (3.9 or 5.2 long tons; 4.4 or 5.8 short tons), dependent on its having been bipedal or quadrupedal respectively.

The describing authors indicated some distinguishing traits. Three of these were autapomorphies, unique derived characters. On the quadrate bone, the notch at the opening separating it from the quadratojugal bone, is located at a very low position, at three quarters of the shaft length measured from the top of the element. This is unique for the Hadrosauridae as a whole. The surangular bone of the lower jaw has only a short ascending branch, not reaching the coronoid process. The sixth tot thirteenth back vertebrae have neural spines that are inclined to the front.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Kamuysaurus

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Kamuysaurus claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Kamuysaurus before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Kamuysaurus ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Kamuysaurus

In research: Kamuysaurus appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Kamuysaurus in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Kamuysaurus is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Dinosaur genera, Dinosaurs of Japan, Fossil taxa described in 2019, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Kamuysaurus outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Kamuysaurus in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Kamuysaurus means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Kamuysaurus out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Kamuysaurus in simple terms?

Why does Kamuysaurus matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Kamuysaurus?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Kamuysaurus.