In Depth
Luanchuanraptor can go down in palaeontological history as the first Asian dromaeosaurid found outside of the Gobi Desert. Beyond this however the partial remains of the holotype make it hard to establish details about this genus. Luanchuanraptor was a dromaeosaurid meaning that it was a relatively small theropod dinosaur similar to others such as Dromaeosaurus and Velociraptor, though how close is currently hard to say. Luanchuanraptor has been described as being a ‘moderately sized’ theropod. yet size estimates can vary greatly upon source from as little as one meter long, a more common one and a half meters all the up to three to even four meters long.
As a dromaeosaurid, Luanchuanraptor is expected to have had enlarged sickle shaped claws on its feet which may have served as killing weapons against prey. Also although not preserved with the holotype, Luanchuanraptor likely had feathers in life since this seems to have been the norm for the dromaeosaurids, though how much and in what places is completely unknown for Luanchuanraptor.
Further Reading
- New dromaeosaurid dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous Qiupa Formation of Luanchuan area, western Henan, China, J-C Lu, L. Xu, X.-L.Zhang, Q. Ji, S.-H. Jia, W.-Y. Hu, J.-M. Zhang, & Y.-H. Wu - 2007.
