An international team of researchers from Portugal, Denmark and Germany, including Martin Luther Halle-Wittenberg University (MLU) explained that the new dinosaur’s name refers to the Greenlandic Inuit language and means “cold bone”. This dinosaur fossil will be transferred to the Danish Museum of Natural History.
The researchers, in the journal Diversity, said dinosaur fossils in the form of two intact skulls were first discovered during excavations in 1994 in East Greenland by paleontologists from Harvard University. One of the specimens was originally thought to be of Plateosaurus, a long-necked dinosaur that lived in Germany, France, and Switzerland during the Triassic Period.
“It is exciting to find close relatives of the famous Plateosaurus, more than a hundred of which have been found here in Germany,” said Dr Oliver Wings of MLU. (Read also; Scientists Reveal Doomsday Impact of Asteroid Collision That Killed Dinosaurs )
The research team performed micro-CT scans of the bones, which allowed them to create digital 3D models of the internal structures and bones still covered in sediment. The anatomy of the two skulls is unique in many ways, for example in the shape and proportions of the bones. “This specimen definitely belongs to a new species,” said Victor Beccari, researcher at NOVA University Lisbon.
Professor Lars Clemmensen from the University of Copenhagen added that the plant-eating dinosaur Issi saaneq lived about 214 million years ago during the Late Triassic Period. At that time the supercontinent Pangea broke up and the Atlantic Ocean began to form. “At that time, the Earth was undergoing a climate change that allowed the first plant-eating dinosaurs to reach Europe and beyond,” he explained.
The two skulls of the new species come from juvenile and near-adult individuals. Regardless of size, differences in bone structure are minor and relate only to proportions. The new Greenland dinosaur is different from all the other sauropodomorphs discovered so far. (Read also; Not T-Rex, This Oldest Meat-Eating Dinosaur Was Called The Dragon Head )
This dinosaur shares similarities with dinosaurs found in Brazil, such as Macrocollum and Unaysaurus, which are nearly 15 million years older. Together with Plateosaurus from Germany, they formed the group of plateosaurids: relatively graceful bipeds that reached 3 to 10 meters in length.
This new find is the first evidence of a distinct Greenland dinosaur species that adds to the diversity of dinosaurs from the Late Triassic (235-201 million years ago). In addition, it is also possible to better understand the evolutionary path and timeline of the iconic group of sauropods that inhabited Earth for nearly 150 million years.
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