A new genus and species of dinosaurs discovered in China were named "Datailong".
On February 29, the reporter learned from a research team from China and Canada that two specimens of the Ankylosaurus subfamily previously found in Huichang County, Jiangxi Province, were new genera and species of Ankylosaurus. Researchers named it "Da Tai Long", which means "accessibility, peace and stability". The discovery of Dataylon is an important addition to the fossil record of the early Ankylosaurus subfamily in the Late Cretaceous.
Ankylosaurus was a group of herbivorous dinosaurs that lived in North America and Asia during the Late Cretaceous. Its most important feature is that its body is covered with a large number of bone plates, as if it is wearing "armor", so it is often called "Tank Dragon". The members of the Ankylosauridae subfamily were larger, had a wider head and body, and had a well-developed tail hammer at the end of the tail.
The picture shows the 3D reconstruction model of Da Tailong. (Provided by the interviewee).
The results were jointly completed by Associate Professor Xing Lida of China University of Geosciences (Beijing) and Executive Director of Fujian Yingliang Stone Natural History Museum Niu Kecheng and scholars from the Canadian Museum of Natural History, and was recently published in the international academic journal Vertebrate Anatomy, Morphology and Paleontology.
It is reported that during road excavation construction in Huichang in 2016, some villagers noticed that white bone objects were faintly visible in the scattered purple-red rubble blocks, but because they were too broken and difficult to identify, they were picked up and kept locally. Until 2018, the Yingliang Stone Natural History Museum of Fujian Province collected the broken stone into the museum and restored, protected and researched it.
The picture shows the fossil specimen of Dataylon after cleaning and restoration. (Provided by the interviewee).
After a long period of stitching and restoration, two stacked ankylosaur specimens gradually appeared. The study found that both specimens were sub-adult individuals with a body length of about 35 to 4 meters, it has a prominent premaxilla with a signature cranial protrusion similar to most other Ankylosaurus subfamilies, and is characterized by a pair of small horns that extend outward on each side of the cheeks.
The picture shows the restoration of the two superimposed and preserved Datailong. (Provided by the interviewee).
According to Xing, Datailong is a derivative group of the Asian Ankylosaurus subfamily, or a sister group with Painted Dragons, which are found in northern China and Mongolia. The overlapping burial posture of the dragon was also seen in the dragon, which was interpreted as the rapid burial of aeolian sand sedimentation at the time, which indirectly illustrates the dragon's social behavior. "It is not known whether the Datalosaurus specimens were deposited in rivers or lakes and were buried in situ, but it is likely to be related to the social behavior of ankylosaurs. ”
*:Xinhua.