Mammalian carnivores vs predatory dinosaurs bite lethality

[Infinity Blade]

Proportionately speaking, how large was its head compared to a hyaenodon, an animal also mentioned to have a huge head for its size?

I'd be lying if I said Hyaenodon's head seems as proportionately large as this.


By Liam Elward->

Hyaenodon does have a relatively big head for its size (as do many theropods and other ancient mammalian predators who chiefly used their jaws as weapons), but erythrosuchids in particular just take this to absurd levels.

And yes, Hyaenodon's carnassial teeth rotated increasingly inwards as time went on, allowing the teeth to shear past and sharpen each other as they dulled (Mellet, 1969). But of course, it couldn't flat out replace its teeth.

[all]

With serrated teeth dinosaurs and practically all of them taking part in killing in most cases predatory dinosaurs take it. 

However bite pressure of predatory dinosaurs varies some having very powerful bite while other relatively weak.

While generally dinosaur bites were deadlier.

I wonder if bear dogs might be interesting challenge to bite of some dinosaurs. Plus American cave bear American cave lion and smilodon among others have quite lethal bites. 

[Supercommunist]

Sorry to again somewhat derail this thread but I found this paper recently and found it interesting.

Although the position in the jaw at which bite forces were measured was not reported (i.e., bite out-lever10), the scaling relationship provided by the authors predicts that a C. serpentina with a head 154 mm wide (~73.5 kg body mass) should bite with a force of 2042 N, similar to that of a Beelzebufo with a head of equal width (2213.7 N).For a given head width, maximum bite-force performance in crocodylians is greater than calculated for C. aurita but less than calculated for Beelzebufo. For crocodylians with a head width of 98.3 mm, corresponding to C. aurita (LACM 163430), bite forces estimated at the position of the largest tooth at the posterior end of the tooth row are 689.3 N for Alligator mississippiensis (American alligator, interpolated from empirical data of bite force at 11th maxillary tooth; ref.14), 680.5 N for Crocodylus porosus (saltwater crocodile, interpolated), and 707.7 N for C. johnstoni (freshwater crocodile, extrapolated) (G. M. Erickson and AKL unpublished data, see ref.24 for relationships between bite force and body size). ese crocodylians would have masses of 8.2 kg, 11.9 kg, and 9.4 kg, respectively. In all cases, our interpolation/extrapolation of bite force relative to head width for crocody-lians exceed our bite force estimate for C. aurita (LACM 163430) by approximately 37–42%. For crocodylians with a head width of 154 mm, corresponding to that of the largest specimen of Beelzebufo, bite force estimates are 1659.6 N for Alligator mississippiensis, 1836.5 N for Crocodylus porosus, and 1863.6 N for C. johnstoni (G. M. Erickson and AKL unpublished data, see ref.24). ese crocodylians would have masses of 24.2 kg, 34.0 kg, and 27.3 kg, respectively. In contrast to the comparison of bite force between crocodylians and C. aurita (LACM 163430), our estimate for the maximum bite force of Beelzebufo exceeds the bite force of crocodylians with a comparable head width by approximately 16–25%.

Although the crocodiles being compared to the frong were young and therefore small it seems a few species of frogs may also be the contender for having the highest bite force among animals for their size.

www.researchgate.net/publication/319940605_Bite_force_in_the_horned_frog_Ceratophrys_cranwelli_with_implications_for_extinct_giant_frogs

[Supercommunist]

Found this interesting quote:

bite force estimates for Basilosaurus isis appear to be comparable to those of very large white sharks [80], although relatively lower than those of some large-headed reptilian predators of similar skull length (Table 6). Reptiles have a laterally unconstrained, multi-aponeurosis m. pterygoideus posterior/ventralis that loops around the lower jaw, and pennate temporal muscles with greater forces per ACSA than the 30–37 N/cm2 specific tension (ST) values for mammals [25], [29].

Sounds like reptiles may have an inherent bite advantage over mammals beyond the fact that they can replace their teeth.

journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0118380#pone.0118380.ref025