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SCIENCEThursday 17 March 2016

Fossil find sheds light on how evolution produced T. rex

MALCOLM RITTER Hans-Dieter Sues, chair of the Department of Paleobiology at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, shows where
AP Science Writer
NEW YORK (AP) How did the new dinosaur, Timurlengia euotica, falls into the dinosaur family tree during a news conference in Washington, Monday,
evolution produce a mon-
strous killer like T. rex? A fos- March 14, 2016. Associated Press
sil find in Central Asia is giv-
ing scientists a glimpse of GOOD TIMING million years ago. So the sinuses found in T. rex. such ancestors looked like,
the process. The discovery helps fill in a size boom happened pret- THE NAME Brusatte said.
T. rex and other tyranno- frustrating gap in the tyran- ty quickly. The creature was dubbed THE PAYOFF
saurs were huge, domi- nosaur fossil record. Before STANDARD EQUIPMENT Timurlengia euotica (TEE’- The discovery helps scien-
nant predators, but they that gap, which began The inner ears of the new- mer-len-GEE’-uh yoo-OH- tists understand how “the
evolved from much smaller some 100 million years ago, found beast already had tih-kuh). The name hon- (anatomical) parts got put
ancestors. The new dis- the ancestral creatures tyrannosaur features as- ors the ancient Central together ... on the path to
covery from Uzbekistan were only about as big as a sociated with good agility Asian ruler Tamerlane and T-rex-hood,” said Thomas R.
indicates that this super- horse. Right after the gap, and hearing low-pitched the large inner ears of the Holtz, Jr. of the University of
sizing happened quickly, at about 80 million years sounds, which might have beast. The fossils include a Maryland, who didn’t par-
and only after the appear- ago, tyrannosaurs were helped it detect prey or braincase and bones from ticipate in the study. And
ance of some anatomical multi-ton behemoths like T. other animals at a dis- the neck, back, tail, feet suggests where to dig for
features that may have rex. The new finding shows tance. But the creature and hands. The creature more fossils to investigate
helped the monster tyran- the forerunners were still lacked the massive, bone- wasn’t a direct ancestor of the transition, he said.q
nosaurs hunt so effectively. relatively small even just 90 snapping teeth and large T. rex, but it indicates what ___
The finding was reported
Monday by Hans-Dieter
Sues of the Smithsonian’s
National Museum of Natu-
ral History in Washington,
Stephen Brusatte of the
University of Edinburgh in
Scotland, and others in a
paper released by the Pro-
ceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences.
THE DISCOVERY
They report finding bones
of a previously unknown
member of the evolution-
ary branch that led to the
huge tyrannosaurs. This ear-
lier dinosaur lived about 90
million years ago, south of
what is now the Aral Sea. It
looked roughly like a T. rex,
but was only about 10 to
12 feet long and weighed
only about 600 pounds at
most, Sues said. T. rex grew
about four times as long
and weighed more than
20 times as much.