Data from: A new juvenile sauropod specimen from the Middle Jurassic Dongdaqiao Formation of East Tibet

Jurassic strata are widely distributed in the eastern part of Tibet
Autonomous Region, and have yielded many dinosaur bones. However, none of
these specimens has been studied extensively, and some remain unprepared.
Here we provide a detailed description of some new sauropod material,
including several cervical vertebrae and a nearly complete scapula,
recovered from the Middle Jurassic of Chaya County, East Tibet. The
cervical vertebrae have short centra that bear ventral midline keels, as
in other early-diverging eusauropods such as Shunosaurus. Moreover, the
cervical centra display deep lateral excavations, partitioned by a septum.
The scapula has proximal and distal ends that are both expanded as in
mamenchisaurids and neosauropods. However, relatively small body size and
lack of fusion of neurocentral sutures in the cervical vertebrae suggest
that the available material is from a juvenile, and the length of the
cervical centra may have increased relative to the size of the rest of the
skeleton in later ontogenetic stages. The new Tibetan sauropod specimens
provide important information on the morphological transition between
Shunosaurus and mamenchisaurids, and extend the known biogeographic range
of early-diverging sauropods in the Middle Jurassic of East Asia.