Mongolia's famous Gobi Desert once was a haven for plants and animals alike. One of the species that used to roam the Gobi was dinosaurs. According to the Natural History Museum of the UK, 47 different species of dinosaurs have been found Mongolia. Ranging from Mammal-eating velociraptors, lizard-hipped sauropods, and spike-armored ankylosaurs could have been spotted roaming in what are now the Martian red sandstone spires of Bayanzag's Flaming Cliffs. It was here, nearly a hundred years ago, that the world's first dinosaur egg nests were found by American scientist Roy Chapman Andrews - the whip-wielding, trilby-wearing inspiration for Indiana Jones.
In April of 2019, Paleontologists in Mongolia have discovered a new species of hadrosauroid dinosaur that roamed what is now the Gobi Desert approximately 90 million years ago. Researchers in Mongolia and Canada reported that the new species sheds light on the evolution of hadrosaurs, dominant herbivores of the Late Cretaceous. Researchers led by Dr. Khishigjav Tsogtbataaar of the Mongolian Academy of Science, Mongolia, and Dr. David Evans of the Royal Ontario Museum, Canada, examined and characterized the complete skeletal remains of a new species of dinosaur which they called Gobihadros Mongoliensis.
The new species of dinosaur was discovered in the Bayshin Tsav region of the Gobi Desert in Mongolia from rocks dating to the early part of the Late Cretaceous. Members of the dinosaur family Hadrosauridae, also known as duck-billed dinosaurs, were widespread and ecologically important large herbivores during the Late Cretaceous epoch, but little is known about their early evolution.
In recent years, many new hadrosaurid species have been filling in this picture, but few complete remains are known from the early part of the Late Cretaceous, which is when the group originated.
The anatomical analysis revealed that Gobihadros mongoliensis doesn’t quite fit into Hadrosauridae, but is a very close cousin, making it the first such dinosaur is known from complete remains from the Late Cretaceous of Central Asia.
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