The latest research led by an international team of scientists has discovered a new species of dinosaur after studying a fossil found in Uzbekistan. The study published in The Royal Society journal this week has identified a theropod dinosaur belonging to the carcharodontosaurus species.
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The team of scientists included Kohei Tanaka and Otabek Ulugbek Ogli Anvarov from Life and Environmental Sciences department of University of Tsukuba, Japan; Darla Zelenitsky, associate professor of dinosaur paleobiology at the University of Calgary, Canada; Akhmadjon Shayakubovich Ahmedshaev from State Geological Museum of the State Committee Uzbekistan, and Yoshitsugu Kobayashi from the Hokkaido University Museum. The study has placed this new species of dinosaur to be 90 million years old, during the Cretaceous period, as reported by CBC.
Before tyrannosaurs, it was the newly discovered dinosaur named Ulughbegsaurus that ruled the region, mentions the study. The new dinosaur is named after the 15th century astronomer and mathematician Ulugh Beg, who lived in the central Asian region. Scientists studied an isolated maxilla or the upper jaw bone of the ancient animal found in the Bissekty Formation of the Kyzylkum Desert, Uzbekistan. The region is known for yielding a rich and diverse assemblage of dinosaurs and other vertebrates from fragmentary remains, mentions the study. Researchers believe that theropods were probably the apex predators of Asiamerica in the early Late Cretaceous prior to the ascent of tyrannosaurids, although few Laurasian species are known from this time due to a poor rock record.
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Comparing the maxilla of Ulughbegsaurus with other contemporaries of the time period, scientists guess that the dinosaur was 7.5–8 m in body length and greater than 1000 kg in body mass. This information also indicates that Ulughbegsaurus was previously unrecognized apex predator of the Bissekty ecosystem while smaller known tryannosauroids and dromaeosaurids were probable mesopredators.
Ulughbegsaurus records the geologically latest stratigraphic co-occurrence of carcharodontosaurid and tyrannosauroid dinosaurs from Laurasia. The evidence indicates carcharodontosaurus remained the dominant predators relative to tyrannosaurus, at least in Asia, as late as the Turonian age.
Tags: #dinosaur, #discovered, #earth, #getgreengetgrowing, #gngagritech, #greenstories, #nature, #Turonian, #wilflife
