Who likes dinosaurs? This creature meaning “giant lizard” is in fact often described as animal wild and ready to pounce on anything that gets in its way.
In November 2022, the world was once again surprised by the discovery of a new type of dinosaur. Found in Romania dinosaur This turned out to have a different description from the dinosaurs we know so far. Example? This dinosaur has a flat head!
Nature still protects these fossils
Uploaded Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology On November 23, 2022, European researchers discovered a new species of dinosaur in the Haţeg Basin in Transylvania, Romania. They called the dinosaur Transylvanosaurus platycephaluswhich literally means “Transylvanian flat-headed dinosaur”.
Researchers find fossils T. platycephalus after examining the fossil head of a dinosaur found in 2007. According to the researchers, the bones T. platycephalus it survived for tens of millions of years because it was protected by the sediments of the river bed where the fossil was found.
“If only T. platycephalus dead and lying there, time and excavation might have crushed all the bones. We wouldn’t be able to study it if that happened,” said one of the researchers at University of TübingenFelix J. Augustin, in an official statement.
The Haţeg Basin is one of the most frequently discovered dinosaur fossil sites. With the first discovery in 1900, the Haţeg Reservoir has become home to 10 dinosaur fossils.
Read also: 7 modern animals that look like dinosaurs, how similar?
Physicist T. platycephalus different
Found in western Romania, T. platycephalus it has a build of 2 meters in length with a “splayed” head and “very broad front”. European researchers say the body size of this flat-headed dinosaur was quite small compared to other dinosaurs 70 million years ago, or during the Cretaceous period.
At the time, the Haţeg Basin was a tropical archipelago and the dinosaurs that lived there were smaller than their relatives elsewhere. According to the researchers this is the condition”Island rule“, where large animals that are isolated on islands experience growth disturbances so they become small.
For example, dinosaur species Sauropods, the largest type of dinosaur to ever exist, only grew to 6 meters in the islands. This size is quite small in comparison Sauropods growing 15 to 20 meters in other places. While it needs to be found out, one of the hypothesized causes is a lack of food supply.
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“Most of the land animals on this island are quite small, except… Pterosaur which has a large build. Most likely the cause is because they can fly and are not affected by the shortage of food supplies on the island,” said Augustin Cnn.
European researchers noted that of the fossils found, all were no longer than 12 cm. However, this is enough to reveal information about T. platycephaluslike walking on two legs, has a thick and dangerous tail, and has been a good swimmer since birth.
In addition, the researchers have also opened up the possibility of researching the brain Transylvanosaurus. According to Augustin, the next step in the research is to compare the proportions of the brain and the eyes Transylvanosaurus with other dinosaurs.
“We can observe the impressions and proportions of brain areas, especially the olfactory and brain areas that are responsible for a range of functions, from senses to memory,” wrote Augustin.
Why is it there? The secret of nature!
Transylvanosaurus is a member of the herbivorous dinosaur family Rhabdodontidae that it was quite common to roam the Earth in the Late Cretaceous. Even so, boss T. platycephalus wider than the species Rhabdodontidae Other. However, what is interesting is the place where the fossils were discovered T. platycephalus of Transylvania.
Close relatives T. platycephalus found in France. According to the researchers, sea fluctuations and tectonic events created land bridges between European islands (which were still tropical at the time) so that dinosaurs could cross west, and some return to Transylvania.
Even so, these are just guesses. Exact reason why Transylvanosaurus could exist in Eastern Europe was not confirmed by the study.
“We still lack the data to answer this question,” Augustin said.
Transylvanosaurus presumably coexist with dinosaur dwarf, crocodile, tortoise and Pterosaur Other. According to the researchers, this study simultaneously refutes the common assumption about the lack of diversity in the Late Cretaceous fauna on the European continent.
Also Read: These 8 Dinosaur Myths Turn Out To Be False, Not According To Popular Stories!
