It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Show-Me-a-saurus! Skeleton of a new type of dinosaur unearthed in Missouri
Mike Snider, USA TODAY Sat, November 27, 2021
Scientists have identified not only the bones of a new dinosaur in southern Missouri, but also may have found a dinosaur hotbed.
The newly identified duck-billed dinosaur, named Parrosaurus missouriensis, grew to about 35 feet in length as an adult. Various dinosaur bones have been found at the dig site over the last eight decades, but now enough have been collected to make certain that a new genus and species had been discovered.
Just more than a month ago, researchers removed the dinosaur's body. "It was enormous, almost the size of a Volkswagen," said Guy Darrough, curator of the Sainte Genevieve Museum Learning Center in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri.
The discovery is like "hitting King Tut's tomb," said Darrough, who first began working at the site four decades ago. "I can't think of another discovery that would be bigger than dinosaurs in Missouri."
The finding also adds to scientists' knowledge of the ecology of the Western Interior Seaway, a body of water that divided North America more than 70 million years ago. While the majority of dinosaur finds have been in western states, this site in southern Missouri – it would have been on the seaway's eastern shore – has been yielding finds for decades.
A full-sized model of the Missouri dinosaur Parrosaurus missouriensis.
About 80 years ago at the site, scientists found the first dinosaur bones there; they were suspected to be the remains of a large sauropod, a plant-eating dinosaur, Darrough said. Charles Gilmore, a paleontologist at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, looked at the bones and, along with Dan Stewart of the Missouri Geological Survey, wrote a paper on the dinosaur, which became known as Parrorsaurus missouriensis, according to the Bollinger County (Mo.) Museum of Natural History.
Another cache of bones – a skeleton of what they learned was a juvenile dinosaur and a dinosaur jaw with teeth – was found in the 1980s, after geologist Bruce Stinchcomb bought the property. Those bones suggested the dinosaur was not a sauropod but actually a hadrosaur, or duck-billed dinosaur.
Scientists had thought the dinosaur looked like the brontosaurus used in the Sinclair Oil advertising, "but it turns out it's a totally different type of dinosaur," Darrough said.
A fossil collector, Darrough asked if he could set up a greenhouse to dig there at the site and successfully found some dinosaur bones. Also found: the tooth of a dinosaur that is a relative to Tyrannosaurus rex.
Darrough contacted Peter Makovicky, a paleontologist who then was curator of dinosaurs at The Field Museum in Chicago. He traveled to Missouri in 2016 and soon had a dig team sent to the site.
"Most people thought we were finding mastodons and mammoths," Darrough said. "Those big animals are like, you know, 10,000 years old. But dinosaurs are like 70 million (years o). I knew they were dinosaur bones, but I just kept quiet."
Darrough was "a very serious fossil collector and actually knew his stuff," Makovicky said, but admitted to being "guarded, but very intrigued" about the find prior to arriving. Peter Makovicky, at left, and Guy Darrough, examining the clay that may contain more bones of the Missouri dinosaur.
The site was "at the bottom of a glen in the Ozarks" and looked "like a frog pond," Makovicky said. "This didn't look like a dinosaur site. There was no exposed bedrock."
But they began finding bones including the tail, two arms and skull of a dinosaur that would have been around 35 feet long, Darrough said. And a little more than a month ago, they removed the body of that dinosaur. "It was enormous, almost the size of a Volkswagen," he said.
"It weighed over 2,000 pounds," said Makovicky, now a professor of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Minnesota. Images from the dig site in southern Missouri where a new type of dinosaur, Parrosaurus missouriensis has been found. Team members Akiko Shinya (left) and MInyoung Son (right) are tunneling through the clay under the jacket to loosen it so it can be flipped and the underside wrapped with plaster bandages.
For perspective, the Tyrannosaurus rex was thought to be about 40 feet long and 12 feet tall, while the Supersaurus dinosaur, revealed earlier this month, is thought to be the longest dinosaur at between 128 and 137 feet.
Based on the findings of the skull, arms and tail section, Makovicky concluded the bones were those of a duck-billed dinosaur and, since the original dinosaur name applied to the site, has been christened Parrorsaurus missouriensis. The dinosaur had already been named the state dinosaur of the state of Missouri, based on the previous findings.
There site will likely yield remains of at least four different Parrosaurus missouriensis dinosaurs, Makovicky said.
"Potentially there's a lot more here," he said. "We're actually looking at something that might be a mass death occurrence, like an entire herd that perished and washed into this waterhole or lagoon."
Speaking of death at the dig site, continuing research resulted in the finding of the "bony armor from a giant crocodile," a crocodilian, said Darrough, whose Lost World Studios creates life-sized dinosaur models for museums and botanical gardens.
Vern Bauman directing removal of the massive plaster jacket containing part of the skeleton of the Missouri dinosaur, Parrosaurus missouriensis in 2021.
"These things are like 50 feet long and they're big enough to take down a dinosaur. So when the Parrosaurus herds would be coming down to take a drink, these guys could snag them around the neck and pull them into the water and drown them. When you get a crocodile big enough to take down a dinosaur that is a big crocodile."
Regardless of what else is found, the Missouri dig has been a great example of scientific collaboration between paleontologists and "dedicated and generous local volunteers, who essentially started this project over 30 years ago," Makovicky said.
And it has helped expand the knowledge of dinosaurs in the U.S. east of the Western Interior Seaway, which at one point spread to the Appalachian Mountains.
"Most of the dinosaurs that every 6-year-old is familiar with, Tyrannosaurs, your various horned dinosaurs and duck-bills, and so on, were living west of the Seaway," Makovicky said. "From the eastern seaboard and the Midwestern states, we have far, far less knowledge of dinosaurs. So when you actually find a site where you have not just scraps, but multiple skeletons together, that's a real windfall." Follow Mike Snider on Twitter: @mikesnider.
In a bizarre but yet exciting incident, a scientist discovered a dinosaur fossil while running along the shore of Hebridean island in Scotland. The dinosaur fossil was discovered by Dr. Elsa Panciroli, who was with her team members looking for remains of other animals. Panciroli, while talking to the press, said that she stumbled upon the bone of the dinosaur while running and trying to catch up with other members of her team. The dinosaur fossil is reportedly 166 million-year-old, dated to the Middle Jurassic period.
A 166 million-year-old dinosaur bone has been found on the isle of Eigg!
Dr Panciroli (@gsciencelady) made the discovery on the Hebridean island. The find has since been identified as belonging to a stegosaurian dinosaur – like Stegosaurus pic.twitter.com/ri5nnLyqAb— National Museums Scotland (@NtlMuseumsScot) August 26, 2020
The bone has been kept in the National Museums Scotland in Edinburgh, where it has been displayed for visitors. According to reports, scientists in Scotland have been searching dinosaur bones for more than 200 hundred years. Until now the only dinosaur fossil discovered in Scotland was on the Isle of Skye. This is the first time that a dinosaur bone has been found os isle of Eigg, where previously only marine reptile and fish fossils were discovered. The dinosaur fossil found on the small island is a limb bone, which is about 50 centimetres long in size.
The find has since been identified as belonging to a stegosaurian dinosaur, like Stegosaurus. Panciroli discovered the bone on a National Geographic funded fieldwork in 2017. The bone was badly eroded, but paleontologist and Panciroli's colleague Nigel Larkin carefully prepared it for the team to study. It was probably a juvenile, and bite marks show it was scavenged after death, said Panciroli.
Dinosaur bone discovered on Scottish island the 1st of its kind in the country
Paleontologist Elsa Panciroli was running to catch up with her colleagues when she spotted the rare fossil
CBC Radio · Posted: Aug 28, 2020 5:57 PM ET | Last Updated: August 28
Researchers believe the discovery is a lower back leg bone of a stegosaurian dinosaur, a species not seen in Scotland before. (N. Larkin)
A rare dinosaur bone from the Middle Jurassic was discovered in Scotland, thanks to the keen eye of a local paleontologist.
Elsa Panciroli got separated from her colleagues while searching for fossils on the Scottish Isle of Eigg. She was hopping from boulder to boulder on the shoreline to catch up with the rest of the team when something caught her eye.
"I suddenly realized the boulder I had just hopped onto and run past, it had something in it. But I wasn't sure quite what," Panciroli, who is a paleontologist at National Museums Scotland, told As It Happens guest host Helen Mann.
"So I turned around, went back to look, and it was a dinosaur bone sticking out of the boulder on the shoreline I'd just literally stepped on."
Her discovery turned out to be a 48-centimetre dinosaur bone, belonging to a species that has never been seen in Scotland before.
Scottish paleontologist Elsa Panciroli discovered a fossil that turned out to be a leg bone from a Jurassic-era stegosaurus. (S. Brusatte)
1st dinosaur on Eigg
Panciroli was so surprised to find the dinosaur bone, she says she downplayed her discovery to her colleagues at first.
"I was a bit reluctant to say the d-word, so I just kept saying I found something," she said. "And eventually they teased [it] out of me, and of course the moment I said 'dinosaur' everyone ... wanted to come and have a look."
Hundreds of people have likely walked over the boulder without noticing anything, she said, and finding the fossil was a matter of luck as much as training.
"I think a lot of the time for people who search for fossils, it's about pattern recognition. You're looking to recognize something. And it was almost unconscious, because I wasn't looking anymore; I was running."
Panciroli said Eigg has been extensively studied, and the purpose of the trip was to look for fossils seen on the island before, like those of marine reptiles and fish.
The researchers never expected to find signs of something as big as a dinosaur — and it turns out that Panciroli's discovery is even rarer than that. Rare fossil from the Middle Jurassic
After months of extensive tests on the bone, its owner was established to be a young stegosaurian dinosaur from the Middle Jurassic period. This is the first time this type of dinosaur and a fossil this old have been found in Scotland.
"It's 166 million years old, and this is a time when fossils — globally speaking, not just in Scotland — are very, very rare," Panciroli said.
"So just finding it in the first place is really quite significant."
Panciroli imagined the last moments of the young stegosaurus, whose fossilized bone she discovered, in her painting. (Elsa Panciroli )
It's also the first time a dinosaur fossil has been found on Eigg; all other dino fossils in Scotland were discovered on the Isle of Skye.
The newfound bone was likely a back lower leg bone of a stegosaurian dinosaur, a large quadruped species with distinctive plates on the back.
Previously, only fossils from two different types of dinosaurs — "the big, long-necked, very heavy dinosaurs" and "the meat-eating dinosaurs that walk on two legs" — have been found in Scotland, Panciroli said.
Researchers will now continue looking for fossils on Eigg and Skye in hopes of building a more complete picture of the ecosystem of that time period.
"We already know that there were also mammals at this time, the very earliest ones, but also things like salamanders, crocodiles, turtles — so we can even look at food chains. It really is only the beginning of research," Panciroli said.
The researcher also said she was happy to find something so close to home. "It's always lovely to find something in your home country. I think I expected that I would probably have to travel abroad to look for something like this, so it's a big surprise."
Written by Olsy Sorokina. Interview produced by Jeanne Armstrong.
Tuesday, July 16, 2024
Gnatalie is the only green-boned dinosaur found on the planet. She will be on display in LA
A 150 million year old dinosaur skeleton is displayed at the Natural History Museum’s new welcome center currently under construction on Tuesday, July 2, 2024 in Los Angeles. It’s newest resident is big, green, and 150 million years old, the 75-foot-long green dinosaur named Gnatalie which will be available for public viewing in the fall at the museum. Researches believe Gnatalie (pronounced Natalie) is a member of a new species of sauropod, a long-necked dinosaur that lived 150 million years ago in the late Jurassic Era. The skull of a 150 million year old dinosaur is displayed at the Natural History Museum’s new welcome center currently under construction on Tuesday, July 2, 2024 in Los Angeles. It’s newest resident is big, green, and 150 million years old, the 75-foot-long green dinosaur named Gnatalie which will be available for public viewing in the fall at the museum. Researches believe Gnatalie (pronounced Natalie) is a member of a new species of sauropod, a long-necked dinosaur that lived 150 million years ago in the late Jurassic
A 150 million year old dinosaur skeleton is displayed at the Natural History Museum’s new welcome center currently under construction on Tuesday, July 2, 2024 in Los Angeles. It’s newest resident is big, green, and 150 million years old, the 75-foot-long green dinosaur named Gnatalie which will be available for public viewing in the fall at the museum. Researches believe Gnatalie (pronounced Natalie) is a member of a new species of sauropod, a long-necked dinosaur that lived 150 million years ago in the late Jurassic Era. The mid section of a 150 million year old dinosaur skeleton is displayed at the Natural History Museum’s new welcome center currently under construction on Tuesday, July 2, 2024. Los Angeles’s newest resident is big, green, and 150 million years old, the 75-foot-long green dinosaur named Gnatalie which will be available for public viewing in the fall at the museum. Researches believe Gnatalie (pronounced Natalie) is a member of a new species of sauropod, a long-necked dinosaur that lived 150 million years ago in the late Jurassic Era. Museum employees walk past a 150 million year old dinosaur skeleton on display at the Natural History Museum’s new welcome center currently under construction on Tuesday, July 2, 2024. Los Angeles’s newest resident is big, green, and 150 million years old, the 75-foot-long green dinosaur named Gnatalie (pronounced Natalie) which will be available for public viewing in the fall at the museum. Chris Weisbart, associate vice president of exhibitions at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles talks during an interview at the museum on Tuesday, July 2, 2024. Los Angeles’s newest resident is big, green, and 150 million years old, the 75-foot-long green dinosaur named Gnatalie (pronounced Natalie) which will be available for public viewing in the fall at the museum. Weisbart said “We want it to be named by the people of LA and we want it to express how engaged we are with our communities”. While researchers referred to the fossil as Gnatalie after the swarms of stinging gnats that attacked them during the excavation, Los Angeles residents confirmed the name earlier this year in a popular vote.
(AP Photo/Richard Vogel)Read More
BY JAIMIE DING July 14, 2024
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The latest dinosaur being mounted at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles is not only a member of a new species — it’s also the only one found on the planet whose bones are green, according to museum officials.
Named “Gnatalie” (pronounced Natalie) for the gnats that swarmed during the excavation, the long-necked, long-tailed herbivorous dinosaur’s fossils got its unique coloration, a dark mottled olive green, from the mineral celadonite during the fossilization process.
While fossils are typically brown from silica or black from iron minerals, green is rare because celadonite forms in volcanic or hydrothermal conditions that typically destroy buried bones. The celadonite entered the fossils when volcanic activity around 50 million to 80 million years ago made it hot enough to replace a previous mineral.
The dinosaur lived 150 million years ago in the late Jurassic Era, making it older than Tyrannosaurus rex — which lived 66 million to 68 million years ago.
Researchers discovered the bones in 2007 in the Badlands of Utah.
“Dinosaurs are a great vehicle for teaching our visitors about the nature of science, and what better than a green, almost 80-foot-long dinosaur to engage them in the process of scientific discovery and make them reflect on the wonders of the world we live in!” Luis M. Chiappe of the museum’s Dinosaur Institute said in a statement about his team’s discovery.
Matt Wedel, anatomist and paleontologist at Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona near Los Angeles, said he heard “rumors of a green dinosaur way back when I was in graduate school.” When he glimpsed the bones while they were still being cleaned, he said they were “not like anything else that I’ve ever seen.”
The dinosaur is similar to a sauropod species called Diplodocus, and the discovery will be published in a scientific paper next year. The sauropod, referring to a family of massive herbivores that includes the Brontosaurus and Brachiosaurus, will be the biggest dinosaur at the museum and can be seen this fall in its new welcome center.
John Whitlock, who teaches at Mount Aloysius College, a private Catholic college in Cresson, Pennsylvania, and researches sauropods, said it was exciting to have such a complete skeleton to help fill in the blanks for specimens that are less complete.
“It’s tremendously huge, it really adds to our ability to understand both taxonomic diversity ... but also anatomical diversity,” Whitlock said.
The dinosaur was named “Gnatalie” last month after the museum asked for a public vote on five choices that included Verdi, a derivative of the Latin word for green; Olive, after the small green fruit symbolizing peace, joy, and strength in many cultures; Esme, short for Esmeralda, which is Spanish for Emerald; and Sage, a green and iconic L.A. plant also grown in the Natural History Museum’s Nature Gardens.
Monday, June 24, 2024
PALEONTOLOGY
New study finds dinosaur fossils did not inspire the mythological griffin
UNIVERSITY OF PORTSMOUTH
IMAGE:
PAINTING OF A GRIFFIN, A LION-RAPTOR CHIMAERA, ALONGSIDE THE FOSSILS OF PROTOCERATOPS, A HORNED DINOSAUR. THE LATTER ARE SAID TO HAVE INFORMED THE LORE AND APPEARANCE OF THE FORMER, BUT OUR STUDY SUGGESTS THAT THERE IS NO COMPELLING CONNECTION BETWEEN DINOSAURS AND GRIFFINS.
A popular and widely-promoted claim that dinosaur fossils inspired the legend of the griffin, the mythological creature with a raptorial bird head and wings on a lion body, has been challenged in a new study.
The specific link between dinosaur fossils and griffin mythology was proposed over 30 years ago in a series of papers and books written by folklorist Adrienne Mayor. These started with the 1989 Cryptozoology paper entitled ‘Paleocryptozoology: a call for collaboration between classicists and cryptozoologists’, and was cemented in the seminal 2000 book ‘The First Fossil Hunters. The idea became a staple of books, documentaries and museum exhibits.
It suggests that an early horned dinosaur of Mongolia and China, Protoceratops, was discovered by ancient nomads prospecting for gold in Central Asia. Tales of Protoceratops bones then travelled southwest on trade routes to inspire, or at least influence, stories and art of the griffin.
Griffins are some of the oldest mythological creatures, first appearing in Egyptian and Middle Eastern art during the 4th millennium BC, before becoming popular in ancient Greece during the 8th century BC.
Protoceratops was a small (around 2 metres long) dinosaur that lived in Mongolia and northern China during the Cretaceous period (75-71 million years ago). They belong to the horned dinosaur group, making it a relative of Triceratops, although they actually lack facial horns. Like griffins, Protoceratops stood on four legs, had beaks, and had frill-like extensions of their skulls that, it’s been argued, could be interpreted as wings.
In the first detailed assessment of the claims, study authors Dr Mark Witton and Richard Hing, palaeontologists at the University of Portsmouth, re-evaluated historical fossil records, the distribution and nature of Protoceratops fossils, and classical sources linking the griffin with the Protoceratops, consulting with historians and archeologists to fully understand the conventional, non-fossil based view of griffin origins. Ultimately, they found that none of the arguments withstood scrutiny.
Ideas that Protoceratops would be discovered by nomads prospecting for gold, for instance, are unlikely when Protoceratops fossils occur hundreds of kilometres away from ancient gold sites. In the century since Protoceratops was discovered, no gold has been reported alongside them. It also seems doubtful that nomads would have seen much of Protoceratops skeletons, even if they prospected for gold where their fossils occur.
“There is an assumption that dinosaur skeletons are discovered half-exposed, lying around almost like the remains of recently-deceased animals,” said Dr Witton. “But generally speaking, just a fraction of an eroding dinosaur skeleton will be visible to the naked eye, unnoticed to all except for sharp-eyed fossil hunters.
“That’s almost certainly how ancient peoples wandering around Mongolia encountered Protoceratops. If they wanted to see more, as they’d need to if they were forming myths about these animals, they’d have to extract the fossil from the surrounding rock. That is no small task, even with modern tools, glues, protective wrapping and preparatory techniques. It seems more probable that Protoceratops remains, by and large, went unnoticed — if the gold prospectors were even there to see them.”
Similarly, the geographic spread of griffin art through history does not align with the scenario of griffin lore beginning with Central Asian fossils and then spreading west. There are also no unambiguous references to Protoceratops fossils in ancient literature.
Protoceratops is only griffin-like in being a four-limbed animal with a beak. There are no details in griffin art suggesting that their fossils were referenced but, conversely, many griffins were clearly composed from features of living cats and birds.
Dr Witton added: “Everything about griffin origins is consistent with their traditional interpretation as imaginary beasts, just as their appearance is entirely explained by them being chimaras of big cats and raptorial birds. Invoking a role for dinosaurs in griffin lore, especially species from distant lands like Protoceratops, not only introduces unnecessary complexity and inconsistencies to their origins, but also relies on interpretations and proposals that don’t withstand scrutiny.”
The authors are keen to stress that there is excellent evidence of fossils being culturally important throughout human history, and innumerable instances of fossils inspiring folklore around the world, referred to as ‘geomyths’.
Richard Hing said: “It is important to distinguish between fossil folklore with a factual basis — that is, connections between fossils and myth evidenced by archaeological discoveries or compelling references in literature and artwork — and speculated connections based on intuition.
“There is nothing inherently wrong with the idea that ancient peoples found dinosaur bones and incorporated them into their mythology, but we need to root such proposals in realities of history, geography and palaeontology. Otherwise, they are just speculation.”
Dr Witton added: “Not all mythological creatures demand explanations through fossils. Some of the most popular geomyths — Protoceratops and griffins, fossil elephants and cyclopes, and dragons and dinosaurs — have no evidential basis and are entirely speculative. We promote these stories because they’re exciting and seem intuitively plausible, but doing so ignores our growing knowledge of fossil geomyths grounded in fact and evidence. These are just as interesting as their conjectural counterparts, and probably deserve more attention than entirely speculated geomythological scenarios.”
The study is published in Interdisciplinary Science Reviews.
Comparisons between the skeleton of Protoceratops and ancient griffin art. The griffins are all very obviously based on big cats, from their musculature and long, flexible tails to the manes (indicated by coiled “hair” on the neck), and birds, and differ from Protoceratops in virtually all measures of proportion and form. Image compiled from illustrations in Witton and Hing (2024).
CREDIT
Dr Mark Witton
JOURNAL
Interdisciplinary Science Reviews
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Literature review
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
Not applicable
ARTICLE TITLE
‘Did the horned dinosaur Protoceratops inspire the griffin?’
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
21-Jun-2024
Scientists reveal new species of horned
dinosaur that roamed northern U.S.
An artist's impression of Lokiceratops as it would have appeared in swamps of northern Montana 78 million years ago, complete with two Probrachylophosaurus moving past in the background.
June 20 (UPI) -- American scientists announced Thursday the discovery of a new species of horned dinosaur which at 11,000 pounds and 22 feet long is the largest centrosaurine ever found in North America and roamed the swamps of what is now the badlands of Montana in the late Cretaceous period 78 million years ago.
The new dinosaur was identified and subsequently christened Lokiceratops rangiformis by Colorado State University affiliate faculty member Joseph Sertich and Utah University Professor Mark Loewen due to an ostentatious set of curving blade-like horns on the rear of its "frill" and an asymmetrical horn that bear comparison with the antlers of caribou, Colorado State University said in a news release.
The find, detailed in a peer-reviewed study published in the scientific journal PeerJ, is named for Loki, a mythological human-like Norse god with horns and its Triceratops descendant and translates, approximately, to "Loki's horned face that looks like a caribou."
"The dinosaur now has a permanent home in Denmark, so we went with a Norse god, and in the end, doesn't it just really look like Loki with the curving blades?" said Loewen, co-author and paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah in Salt Lake City.
Speaking as a replica was put on display to the public at the museum, co-author and Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute paleontologist Sertich said: "It's one of those stories with a happy ending, where it didn't go to somebody's mansion. It ended up in a museum, where it will be preserved forever so people can study it and enjoy visiting it."
The original is on permanent display at the Museum of Evolution on the Danish island of Lolland, south of Copenhagen, Denmark, to which both men are scientific consultants.
Sertich and Loewen reconstructed the head and frill/horns array from dinner plate-sized and smaller-sized bone fragments found in 2019 in northern Montana, just south of the Canadian border
Once they had pieced the skull together they realized they had a new dinosaur species, the largest ever North American find from a group of horned dinosaurs called centrosaurines.
It has the largest frill horns ever seen on a horned dinosaur but does not have the nose horn common to most centrosaurines.
"This new dinosaur pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear, sporting the largest frill horns ever seen in a ceratopsian," said Sertich.
"These skull ornaments are one of the keys to unlocking horned dinosaur diversity and demonstrate that evolutionary selection for showy displays contributed to the dizzying richness of Cretaceous ecosystems."
However, as formidable as its appearance makes it seem Lokicertatops' elaborate headgear had everything to do with showing off and nothing to do with predation as it was, like Triceraptops, a harmless plant eater.
Comparing dinosaur horns to feathers on birds, Sertich noted how they have evolved distinct colors and patterns to differentiate the species to which they belong from other similar bird species.
"We think that the horns on these dinosaurs were analogous to what birds are doing with displays. They're using them either for mate selection or species recognition," he said.
Lokiceratops was excavated from the same rock layer as four other dinosaur species suggesting all five were alive 78 million years ago in the swamps and coastal plains along the eastern shore of a then-sea down the middle of the continent, three of which were closely related but only found in that region.
"It's unheard-of diversity to find five living together, similar to what you would see on the plains of East Africa today with different horned ungulates," Sertich said.
The discovery of Loki is evidence these three species appeared within a relatively short period but were geographically limited to this distinct locale -- a process often seen among birds on islands or otherwise isolated habitats -- unlike the wide range of mammals, such as elk, now found all across the western United States.
However, these regional differences had been ironed out by the end of the Cretaceous era, leaving just two species of horned dinosaurs from Canada to Mexico which Sertich postulated could have been due to regional differences in climatic conditions being replaced with a homogenous climate.
The end of the Cretaceous period spelled the end for the horned dinosaurs, and indeed the dinosaur era itself, with the Chicxulub impactor when a 7-mile-wide asteroid slammed into the north coast of what is now Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula at 45,000 miles-per-hour.
The study offers both the most comprehensive genealogy of horned dinosaurs and demonstrates that there was far greater diversity among the dinosaurs than previously understood.
"Lokiceratops helps us understand that we only are scratching the surface when it comes to the diversity and relationships within the family tree of horned dinosaurs," said Loewen.
What do you get when you cross Norse mythology with a 78-million-year-old ancestor to the Triceratops? Answer: Lokiceratops rangiformis, a plant-eating dinosaur with a very fancy set of horns.
The new dinosaur was identified and named by Colorado State University affiliate faculty member Joseph Sertich and University of Utah Professor Mark Loewen. The dinosaur’s name, announced today in the scientific journal PeerJ, translates roughly to “Loki’s horned face that looks like a caribou.”
Loewen and Sertich, co-lead authors of the PeerJ study, dubbed the new species Lokiceratops (lo-Kee-sare-a-tops) rangiformis (ran-ɡi-FOHR-mees) because of the unusual, curving blade-like horns on the back of its frill – the shield of bone at the back of the skull – and the asymmetrical horns at the peak of the frill, reminiscent of caribou antlers.
“The dinosaur now has a permanent home in Denmark, so we went with a Norse god, and in the end, doesn't it just really look like Loki with the curving blades?” Loewen said, referring to the trickster god’s weapon of choice.
Loewen, a paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah, and Sertich, a paleontologist with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, are both scientific consultants for the Museum of Evolution in Denmark, Lokiceratops’ new home.
"It's one of those stories with a happy ending, where it didn't go to somebody's mansion," Sertich said. “It ended up in a museum, where it will be preserved forever so people can study it and enjoy visiting it.”
New dinosaur discovery
Lokiceratops was discovered in 2019 in the badlands of northern Montana, two miles (3.2 kilometers) south of the U.S.-Canada border. Sertich and Loewen helped reconstruct the dinosaur from fragments the size of dinner plates and smaller. Once they had pieced the skull together, they realized the specimen was a new type of dinosaur.
Estimated to be 22 feet (6.7 meters) long and weigh 11,000 pounds (5 metric tonnes), Lokiceratops is the largest dinosaur from the group of horned dinosaurs called centrosaurines ever found in North America. It has the largest frill horns ever seen on a horned dinosaur and lacks the nose horn that is characteristic among its kin.
“This new dinosaur pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear, sporting the largest frill horns ever seen in a ceratopsian,” Sertich said in a press release announcing the dinosaur’s unveiling at the Natural History Museum of Utah, where a replica is displayed. “These skull ornaments are one of the keys to unlocking horned dinosaur diversity and demonstrate that evolutionary selection for showy displays contributed to the dizzying richness of Cretaceous ecosystems.”
Sertich likened dinosaur horns to feathers on birds. Birds use feather colors and patterns to differentiate their own species among other, similar species of birds.
"We think that the horns on these dinosaurs were analogous to what birds are doing with displays,” Sertich said. “They're using them either for mate selection or species recognition.”
What Loki’s horns tell us about dinosaurs
Lokiceratops was excavated from the same rock layer as four other dinosaur species, indicating that five different dinosaurs lived side by side 78 million years ago in the swamps and coastal plains along the eastern shore of Laramidia, the western landmass of North America created when a seaway divided the continent. Three of these species were closely related but not found outside the region.
"It's unheard-of diversity to find five living together, similar to what you would see on the plains of East Africa today with different horned ungulates,” Sertich said.
Unlike the broad range of large wild mammals that roam the U.S. West today, such as elk, these ancient animals were geographically limited, he added. Loki’s discovery provides evidence that these species evolved rapidly within a small area, a process sometimes seen in birds.
By the time Triceratops came onto the scene 12 million years later, regional differences had been homogenized into just two species of horned dinosaurs from Canada to Mexico – possibly in response to a more homogenous climate, Sertich said.
The study shows that dinosaur diversity has been underestimated and presents the most complete family tree of horned dinosaurs to date.
"Lokiceratops helps us understand that we only are scratching the surface when it comes to the diversity and relationships within the family tree of horned dinosaurs," Loewen said.
The skull of Lokiceratops rangiformis, mounted and on exhibit at the Museum of Evolution in Maribo, Denmark.
Lokiceratops rangiformis gen. et sp. nov. (Ceratopsidae: Centrosaurinae) from the Campanian Judith River Formation of Montana reveals rapid regional radiations and extreme endemism within centrosaurine dinosaurs
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
20-Jun-2024
New, giant horned dinosaur discovered in the ancient swamps of Montana
Lokiceratops rangiformis is among the largest and most ornate horned dinosaur ever found, with two huge blade-like horns on the back of its frill.
UNIVERSITY OF UTAH
IMAGE:
PORTRAIT RECONSTRUCTIONS OF ALL FOUR CENTROSAURINE DINOSAURS THAT LIVED TOGETHER IN THE KENNEDY COULEE ASSEMBLAGE OF NORTHERN MONTANA AND SOUTHERN ALBERTA.
A remarkable, new species of horned, plant-eating dinosaur is being unveiled at the Natural History Museum of Utah. The dinosaur, excavated from the badlands of northern Montana just a few miles from the USA-Canada border, is among the largest and most ornate ever found, with two huge blade-like horns on the back of its frill. The distinctive horn pattern inspired its name, Lokiceratops rangiformis, meaning “Loki’s horned face that looks like a caribou.” The new species was announced today in the scientific journal PeerJ.
More than 78 million years ago, Lokiceratops inhabited the swamps and floodplains along the eastern shore of Laramidia. This island continent represents what is now the western part of North America created when a great seaway divided the continent around 100 million years ago. Mountain building and dramatic changes in climate and sea level have since altered the hothouse world of Laramidia where Lokiceratops and other dinosaurs thrived. The behemoth is a member of the horned dinosaurs called ceratopsids, a group that evolved around 92 million years ago during the Late Cretaceous, diversified into a myriad of fantastically ornamented species, and survived until the end of the time of dinosaurs. Lokiceratops (lo-Kee-sare-a-tops) rangiformis (ran-ɡi-FOHR-mees) possesses several unique features, among them are the absence of a nose horn, huge, curving blade-like horns on the back of the frill—the largest ever found on a horned dinosaur—and a distinct, asymmetric spike in the middle of the frill.
Lokiceratops rangiformis appeared at least 12 million years earlier than its famous cousin Triceratops and was the largest horned dinosaur of its time. The name Lokiceratops translates as “Loki’s horned face” honoring the blade-wielding Norse god Loki. The second name, rangiformis,refers to the differing horn lengths on each side of the frill, similar to the asymmetric antlers of caribou and reindeer.
“This new dinosaur pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear, sporting the largest frill horns ever seen in a ceratopsian,” said Joseph Sertich, a paleontologist with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Colorado State University, and co-leader of the study. “These skull ornaments are one of the keys to unlocking horned dinosaur diversity and demonstrate that evolutionary selection for showy displays contributed to the dizzying richness of Cretaceous ecosystems.”
Lokiceratops rangiformis is the fourth centrosaurine, and fifth horned dinosaur overall, identified from this single assemblage. While ceratopsian ancestors were widespread across the northern hemisphere throughout the Cretaceous period, their isolation on Laramidia led to the evolution of huge body sizes, and most characteristically, distinctive patterns of horns above their eyes and noses, on their cheeks and along the edges of their elongated head frills. Fossils recovered from this region suggest horned dinosaurs were living and evolving in a small geographic area—a high level of endemism that implies dinosaur diversity is underestimated.
“Previously, paleontologists thought a maximum of two species of horned dinosaurs could coexist at the same place and time. Incredibly, we have identified five living together at the same time,” said co-lead author Mark Loewen, paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah and professor in the Department of Geology & Geophysics at the University of Utah. “The skull of Lokiceratops rangiformis is dramatically different from the other four animals it lived alongside.”
Horned dinosaurs were more diverse than previously thought, and some groups had relatively small distributions across the island landmass of Laramidia during the Late Cretaceous
Scientists have argued about the patterns of evolution within the group of horned dinosaurs over the years. “We now recognize over 30 species of centrosaurines within the greater group of horned dinosaurs, with more like Lokiceratopsbeing described every year,” said co-author Andrew Farke from the Raymond M. Alf Museum of Paleontology. This study shows that centrosaurine ceratopsid species and clades were confined to small geographic areas. “The endemism present in centrosaurines is greater than in any other group of dinosaurs,” said undergraduate University of Utah student and co-author Savhannah Carpenter. “Rapid evolution may have led to the 100- to 200-thousand-year turnover of individual species of these horned dinosaurs,” said Loewen. This rapid evolution is most consistent with sexual selection acting upon these animals. “Sexual selection acting on the genes responsible for the horns of the frill would produce modifications to cis-regulatory elements that would express differences in the size and shape of individual frill horns producing the variations in patterns we see in these animals,” said coauthor Jingmai O’Connor of the Field Museum in Chicago.
Reconstruction of Lokiceratops surprised by a crocodilian in the 78-million-year-old swamps of northern Montana, USA.
Lokiceratops rangiformis gen. et sp. nov. (Ceratopsidae: Centrosaurinae) from the Campanian Judith River Formation of Montana reveals rapid regional radiations and extreme endemism within centrosaurine dinosaurs
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
20-Jun-2024
COI STATEMENT
Andrew A. Farke is an Academic Editor for PeerJ. Brock A. Sisson is owner of Fossilogic LLC, which produces cast replicas of Lokiceratops elements..
