In Depth One thing that made Dilong stand out from other dinosaurs upon its discovery was the impressions of protofeathers. These protofeathers were not capable of enabling flight, but were very good at insulating, keeping heat in the body. A higher base temperature for a cold blooded creature means a faster metabolism and more active … Read more
In Depth First discovered in 1984 and originally described as a species of Stokesosaurus in 2008, S. langhami was re-described as a new genus of tyrannosaur in 2013. As is standard practice with such occurences, the original species name of langhami was retained to create the new type species, Juratyrant langhami. The species name is … Read more
In Depth Based upon fossil remains first discovered in 1980, Xenotarsosaurus was named because of the complete fusion between the astragalus and calcaneum bones of the ankle, something that is quite unusual for a theropod dinosaur. At the time of the original description, the rear leg of Xenotarsosaurus was shown to share some similarities with … Read more
In Depth Borogovia is a genus of troodontid dinosaur that lived in Mongolia during the late Cretaceous. As a troodont, Borogovia would have been a predator, certainly capable of taking down smaller prey animals by itself. Also like other troodonts, Borogovia had a specialised second toe, but unlike them, the claw was not sickle shaped … Read more
In Depth One of the most common European sauropods of the Jurassic, Cetiosaurus is actually one of the most primitive. In more advanced sauropods the vertebrae are hollow as a weight saving feature, however Cetiosaurus has solid vertebrae which hint at its basal position in the evolution of sauropods. These solid vertebrae are similar to … Read more
In Depth Officially named and described in 2015 from a single skull, Regaliceratops has already gone down as a particularly interesting ceratopsian dinosaur. The larger ceratopsians of the late cretaceous are usually divided into centrosaurines and chasmosauines, the former having large nasal horns and reduced frills, while the latter usually have reduced nasal horns and … Read more
In Depth The maximum adult size of Dryosaurus is difficult to estimate as all of the known specimens seem to represent animals that were still growing. What is known is that Dryosaurus was a bipedal dinosaur of the bird hipped group. It had a light build with long legs, long neck and a stiff tail, … Read more
In Depth Although not very well known, Jaxartosaurus possesses a hollow helmet shaped crest on top of its skull similar to the better known Corythosaurus. Because this crest is hollow, Jaxartosaurus had been confidently assigned to the Lambeosaurinae group of hadrosaurs which are typified by their hollow crests. The crest of Jaxartosaurus like its lambeosaurine … Read more
In Depth Fossils of this titanosaur were found near lake Rukwa in the Rukwa Valley of Tanzania, so the eventual name of Rukwatitan was really just a foregone conclusion. At about nine meters long, the holotype appears to indicate that Rukwatitan was a fairly small genus of titanosaur. One area of note is that the … Read more
In Depth Laosaurus is today considered to be a dubious genus of dinosaur. Though previously considered to be a hypsilophodont (relative of Hypsilophodon), most of the fossil remains once attributed to Laosaurus have ended up being considered to be other genera such as Orodromeus, Dryosaurus and Othnielosaurus. What few fossils that are still assigned to … Read more