The discovery of a new ferocious dinosaur is helping researchers understand the complex lineage of prehistoric species.
This particular specimen, identified by a jawbone found in Uzbekistan today, is a Carcharodon——A group of terrifying “shark-toothed lizards”, predated the famous fear Tyrannosaurus.
Discoveries in recent years have given people a new understanding of Carcharodon.As National Geographic According to a report in 2019, these giant carnivorous dinosaurs were “top predators for most of the Cretaceous”.
This classification was first established in 1914, when German paleontologist Ernst Stromer discovered their jagged tooth fossils in the Sahara Desert in Egypt. These teeth reminded him of the teeth belonging to the great white shark (Carcharodon genus), so he used this terrifying sea creature as the dinosaur’s homonym.
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Among the findings published by the Royal Society of Open Science, Researchers have now identified a new species of dinosaur Carcharodon Sort by looking at the remains of its jawbone.name Ulubekron UzbekistanThe fossils of dinosaurs were found in the Bissekty formation, which also found the remains of several other dinosaurs. However, scientists believe that this particular creature is by far the largest predator in its environment.
According to life scienceThis particular dinosaur was 26 feet long and weighed 2,200 pounds. Prior to this, the top predator in the area was thought to be Tyrannosaurus Rex-the size difference between the two species is shocking.this Ulufbergron It was twice longer and more than five times heavier than the Tyrannosaurus rex at the time, making it more likely to become the top predator of the ecosystem.
Carcharodontosaurs competed with the smaller Tyrannosaurus rex until the larger, more dominant Tyrannosaurus rex took over the entire landscape.And this new discovery helps to shorten the time frame in which this transition may occur: this 90 million-year-old Ulufbergron The specimen is a carcharodon that has been known to live at the same time as Tyrannosaurus.
“Our findings indicate that Carcharodon was still the main predator in Asia 90 million years ago,” Kohei Tanaka, the lead researcher of the study, explained to Live Science.
In the end, about 80-90 million years ago, as the Tyrannosaurus rex became larger, the Carcharodon was extinct. But scientists are still not sure what caused Carcharodon to lose its dominance.
As the paleontologist Darla Zelenitsky who participated in this research said Smithsonian Magazine“I think any discovery we can make in or around the window between 90 and 80 million years ago will help shed light on this little-known dinosaur-dominant ecosystem.”
She added: “We don’t know why these dinosaurs lost their status as top predators, but maybe this is related to environmental changes, and environmental changes will change the herbivorous dinosaur community within or around this time window.”
