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Researchers find giant predatory dinosaurs

2022-06-09T11:17:21.802Z


A research team has made a spectacular find on the British Isle of Wight: it is probably the remains of the largest hunting dinosaur ever discovered in Europe.


Enlarge image

Spinosaurus reconstruction drawing: bipedal animal with crocodile-like head

Photo: Anthony Hutchings

Some studies are published at a time that guarantees them maximum attention.

This is also the case in the case of a work on a new dinosaur discovery: If the blockbuster »Jurassic Park« brings the primeval creatures back to life this Thursday, that should also increase interest in this discovery.

The discovery by British scientists is spectacular in itself.

On the Isle of Wight, they found the remains of what is thought to be the largest carnivorous dinosaur in Europe.

The bones, which probably come from a so-called Spinosaurus, came to light on the south-west coast of the island off Great Britain.

“It was a huge animal, more than ten meters long.

And possibly the largest hunting dinosaur ever found in Europe,” said Chris Baker of the University of Southampton, lead author of the paper, published in the journal PeerJ Life & Environment.

The fossils, including pelvic bones and vertebrae, are of a two-legged dinosaur with a crocodile-like head — a typical Spinosaur species.

These land hunters, some with conspicuous spinous processes on the dorsal vertebrae that formed a kind of crest on their back, lived during the late Lower and early Upper Cretaceous to the end of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago.

From the remains of the animal that has now been found, it can be seen that a number of scavengers preyed on him after death.

Last year, the researchers from Southampton had already published findings on the study of two similar species.

The new find supports the notion that Spinosaurus originally came from western Europe, where it split into several species before spreading further, the researchers write.

They now want to examine thin layers of the found materials under the microscope to find out the exact age and more information about the growth of the predator.

Foraging through lagoons and across sandbars

"Since only fragments are known so far, we have not yet given it an official scientific name," says co-author Darren Naish.

"We hope that over time more remains will turn up."

However, the geological stratum in which the find was made allows the conclusion that it could be the youngest spinosaur material known to date from Great Britain.

The animal is believed to have stalked through lagoon waters and sandbanks in the region around 125 million years ago in search of food.

It is not the first find of this kind on the Isle of Wight.

Some of the geological formations there are many millions of years old and have frequently released fossils.

joe/dpa

Source: spiegel

All tech articles on 2022-06-09

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