Fossils & Dinosaurs

Scientists have discovered a new dinosaur called Nemicolopterus crypticus, which means "hidden flying forest dweller" The fossils were uncovered in the western part of China's Liaonin province, a region that was forested during the time the flying dino lived there 120 million years ago.

"We have this really amazing creature, sparrow-sized, which lived essentially in the trees, showing us a very new, very interesting side of the evolutionary history of those animals," said Alexander Kellner of the National Museum of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Pterodactyls, the most famous of the flying dinosaurs, have mostly been found along the coastal regions. But now, with the discovery of this new dinosaur, it can be revealed that flying dinosaurs lived deep within the continent as well.

The fossils of flying dinosaurs are very rare as they spent most of their time in trees. Scientists believe that this discovery may aid them in understanding the evolution of the winged vertebrates.

Researchers in South America claim to have discovered the fossilized remains of a one-ton beast of a rodent that thrived in the forests and estuaries of the continent four million years ago. The giant skull of the Josephoartigasia monesi was found on the coast of Rio de La Plata in Uruguay in a broken boulder.

Researchers Andres Rinderknecht of the Museum of Natural History and Ernesto Blanco of the Institute of Physics studied the fossil in Montevideo. J. Monesi's skull was a massive 53 centimeters long, and scientists used this to determine that the size of the rodent was about 1-ton, or the size of a small car.

"We report the discovery of an exceptionally well preserved fossil skull of a new species of rodent, by far the largest ever recorded," said the scientists in the 'Proceedings of the Royal Society, Biological Sciences' journal.

"The creature itself weighed between one and 1.4 tons. Its skull is half-a-metre long and reached a length of around three metres, assuming its body was barrel-shaped like that of a capybara. The incisors of the mega rodent were around four inches and characteristics of its teeth suggest that it dined on aquatic plants, perhaps even fruit," said Dr. Blanco.

Scientists have unveiled a new model of a dinosaur which had a mouth that they're saying is a bit like a vacuum cleaner. The dino in question is called a Nigersaurus taqueti, and the model was created after experts found its ancient bones in the Sahara desert in Africa about 10 years ago.

The Nigersaurus was a vegetarian, and had an odd looking mouth that worked much like a vacuum cleaner - sucking up ferns and leaves. It was about the size of an elephant, and had more than 50 columns of teeth.

Because the Nigersaurus grazed on grasses all day, it's also being called the "cow" of the dinosaur days. It is believed to have roamed the earth 110 million years ago.

A group of scientists from the National Geographic Society used the fossilized bones along with computers to help work out what the dinosaur looked like.