Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Oldest T. Rex Relative Unveiled

Posted by Zonk on from the bet-you'll-never-look-at-chickens-the-same-way-again dept.

Dr Occult writes "A group of researchers have found the forefather of T. Rex in Xinjiang province in northwestern China. It lived around 160 million years ago. This makes it more than twice as old as T. Rex, and the most primitive known member of the family. The researchers were surprised to learn the 3m long dinosaur sported a spectacular feathered crest on its head which may have been brightly coloured."

2 of 80 comments (clear)

  1. Brightly coloured? by robthebob · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Just a thought, but how can you tell from a fossil that this animal had a "brightly coloured" and "feathered" nasal crest?!

  2. Re:Small by Vengeance · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This is not T. Rex, though. Merely the earliest known ancestor which can be considered 'Tyrannosauridae'.

    T. Rex itself, a favorite of schoolchildren everywhere, is notable for being:

    1) Found in the USA
    2) REALLY big, although it seems there may have been larger meat-eaters after all (see Giganotosaurus).
    3) Rather short of reach. This early ancestor had much more 'normal' length arms.
    4) Recent. T. Rex was around at the end of the age of the dinosaurs. This guy was around nearly a hundred million years earlier.

    I am not a paleontologist, but I have a five year old. :-)

    --
    It was a joke! When you give me that look it was a joke.