Scientists have unveiled one of the earliest dinosaurs yet found, an agile meat-eater from the late Triassic period, some 230 million years ago.
Researchers writing in the journal Science say Eodromaeus or "dawn runner" was a small, two-legged creature of not much more than 1.2m in length and 4-6kg in weight.
They reconstructed the dinosaur, a probable ancestor of Tyrannosaurus rex, from an almost complete set of bones found in the Valley of The Moon, in northwestern Argentina.
Eodromaeus ("dawn runner") Eodromaeus ("dawn runner") was discovered in 230-million-year old rocks in the foothills of the Andes
Researchers from Argentina and the US first chanced upon fossilised bones belonging to Eodromaeus in 1996, but it has taken them this long to reconstruct the fragments.
Many of the fossils were covered in iron encrustations and required painstaking work under the microscope before casts could be made and a complete skeleton recreated.
The finished creature claim the researchers, is one of the earliest dinosaurs yet discovered, and could represent the beginnings of the theropod line which eventually leads to T.rex. - BBC
Linkback:
https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=36513.0