Dino of the day – Student-o-saurs - December 12, 2007
A new species of giant carnivorous dinosaur has finally been unveiled, after a fossil found in 1997 was identified by a student as being a distinct, new species. The fossil of Carcharodontosaurus iguidensis, a 14 metres beast with teeth “the size of bananas”, was found in Niger but it was Steve Brusatte, a masters student at the University of Bristol in the UK, who identified the theropod.
Unearthed by fossil hunting paleo-academic Paul Sereno, the bones languished in a Chicago lab before being passed on to Brusatte for a project (BBC, Daily Mail).
“It really is a fascinating animal - it was one of the largest meat eaters that lived on the planet. ... It was a 13m long predator that still had to watch its own back because something bigger was out there - an animal called Spinosaurus,” Brusatte told BBC News.
Kudos is also due to Brusatte for shoehorning a global warming line into his findings: “The Cretaceous world of 95 million years ago was a time of some of the highest sea levels and warmest climates in Earth history. ... This has implications for the world today in which temperatures and sea level are rising. It is precisely by studying these sorts of ecosystems that we can hope to understand how our modern world may change.” (Press release and The Times).
The findings are due to be published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.
Image: mockup of Carcharodontosaurus iguidensis, racing a London bus / Simon Powell
