Parasaurolophus is a genus of herbivorous ornithopod dinosaur that lived in what is now North America and possibly Asia during the Late Cretaceous Period, about 76.5Â-73 million years ago. It was a herbivore that walked both as a biped and as a quadruped. Parasaurolophus was a hadrosaurid, part of a diverse family of Cretaceous dinosaurs known for their range of bizarre head adornments. This genus is known for its large, elaborate cranial crest, which at its largest forms a long curved tube projecting upwards and back from the skull.