Santanaraptor placidus, Kellner, 1999

Holtz, TR jr., 2004, Tyrannosauroidea, The Dinosauria, University of California Press, pp. 111-136 : 3

Santanaraptor placidus

is known only from a single incomplete skeleton (both ischia, hindlimbs, caudal vertebrae, and unidentified bones) from the Aptian Romualdo Member of the Santana Formation of the Araripe Basin, northeastern Brazil (Kellner 1999). The triangular obturator process indicates that this theropod was a coelurosaur; the proximal placement of the process supports its being a nonmaniraptoran. The diverging, rather than parallel, sides of the obturator notch are consistent with this form as a tyrannosauroid or maniraptoran. The metatarsals are not arctometatarsalian. Kellner (1999) diagnoses Santanaraptor by the presence of a foramen at the base of the cranial trochanter, a well-developed sulcus on the femoral head, and a fibular trochlea of triangular shape and constricted at the base. This taxon was found with mineralized soft tissue, including muscle fibers (Kellner 1996a; Kellner and Campos 1998).