Resizing Lisowicia

[Logo7]

The large Polish dicynodont species Lisowicia bojani has been described as one of the largest dicynodonts known, with a body mass of 9.33 tons obtained from long bone circumferences. However, a new study used 3D digital volumetric models in an attempt to get a better understanding of the true size of this genus. The models found that the actual body mass of the species ranged from 4.87 tons to 7.02 tons in an adult, with an average of 5.88 tons, downsizing the weight by about 60%. Thus, this study suggests that synapsids still had to wait until the Eocene to reach a body mass of 9 tons. In addition, the researchers assert that volumetric methods should be preferred when measuring the body mass of extinct animals. Here is a link to the paper describing this study.

Paper (abstract only): https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08912963.2019.1631819?fbclid=IwAR0AZ4yP2Uq47kysE_mB95Otnsz4CaIKybRIxaO7MiuLDWLaUzCwAZ8aiLc&instName=University+of+Oxford&needAccess=true&journalCode=ghbi20&

[suspsy]

That still means Lisowicia had the same mass as a modern elephant, just not a super large male African bush specimen.

[Stuckasaurus (Dino Dad Reviews)]

With the new Dune movie out, I thought up this Lisowicia meme, and this is the best place I can think of to share it. 
God Emperor of Dune becomes God Potato of Dune

https://twitter.com/dinodadreviews/status/1452434123570749450?s=20

[Papi-Anon]

A lot of the reconstructions I saw over the years showed it at roughly female Asian elephant size-ranges, so this isn't as earth-shattering as I initially thought when I read the thread title.

Wonder what else will need resizing now?

[suspsy]

As I noted at the time, Lisowicia is still bigger than any other known member of its family and quite a few dinosaurs for that matter. Female Asian elephants may be smaller than males, but they're still pretty damn big.

[TaranUlas]

As I noted at the time, Lisowicia is still bigger than any other known member of its family and quite a few dinosaurs for that matter. Female Asian elephants may be smaller than males, but they're still pretty damn big.

Yep. At the zoo I do volunteer work for, we have an exhibit with 6 adult Asian Elephants (1 male, 5 females.) I think I maybe come up to the upper arm bones of the female elephants at best. They are spectacularly massive and I always have to remind myself that they are the smallest elephant species of the 3 alive today (unless I misremembered the Forest Elephant's size.)

[suspsy]

Forest elephants are the smallest of the three.

[andrewsaurus rex]

I generally take body mass estimates with a grain of salt as they usually have wide ranges and vary on a regular basis with new techniques and studies.  To be honest, this new estimate puts Liso bigger than I figured it really was, so in my mind it just got larger, not smaller.

[TheCambrianCrusader]

A bit off topic but man is it irritating when you find a scientific paper you're genuinely interested in and it turns out you need to get access for it.
Otherwise this doesn't really change much as Lisowicia is still the largest non-mammalian synapsid (and if I recall one of the largest terrestrial animals of the Triassic?) by quite a substantial margin. Although this does get me wondering if there were other Triassic dicynodonts that achieved similar sizes or if Lisowicia was just a bizarre outlier.