Brachiosaurus and human metacarpals compared
October 27, 2019
Nothing too serious here, just a fun shot I got while in the collections at BYU this past week. The Brachiosaurus element is metacarpal 1 (thumb column) from BYU 4744, the Potter Creek material. I highlighted my own metacarpal 3. There is a metacarpal 3 from this specimen, but I didn’t see it on the shelf. According to D’Emic and Carrano (2019), the MC3 is 60cm long, vs 57cm for this MC1. So this photo could have been 3cm more impressive!
Oh, ignore the tag on the left that says “radius”. You could be forgiven for thinking that the bone I have my hand on is a radius, but the radius from this individual is 1.34 meters long, or about two-and-a-third times the length of this metacarpal.
Reference
D’Emic, M.D. and Carrano, M.T., 2019. Redescription of Brachiosaurid Sauropod Dinosaur Material From the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation, Colorado, USA. The Anatomical Record.
Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week 
October 28, 2019 at 11:40 am
My immediate reaction was surprise that the human metacarpal was so robust. (But yes, I checked against skeletons, it does look right.)
October 30, 2019 at 3:44 pm
….as well as that of Brachiosaurus, the MC is certainly robust! Also, is very interesting to observe that Brachiosaurus had more elongated forelimbs than Giraffatian. This MC I is about 3% shorter than that of SII, while the associated radius is 8% longer than Berlin specimen!
May 30, 2020 at 1:09 am
[…] post is a sequel to one from last year, “Brachiosaurus and human metacarpals compared“, which featured metacarpal 3 from BYU 4744, the partial skeleton of Brachiosaurus from […]
July 15, 2022 at 6:35 am
Nice post tthanks for sharing