- PHILADELPHIA -- A curious
piece of bone spotted by a University of Pennsylvania professor during
a horseback ride in southern Montana led to the discovery of a new dinosaur
with a long neck, a whip-like tail and a mysterious extra hole in its skull.
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- The new find -- a Suuwassea emilieae -- is a sauropod,
a classification of plant-eating dinosaurs with long necks and tails, small
heads and four elephant-like legs. At 50 feet long, it's a smaller cousin
of better-known sauropods Diplodocus and Apatosaurus.
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- The 150-million-year-old creature is described (PDF)
by scientists in the current issue of the paleontology journal, Acta Paleontologica
Polonica.
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- "It has a number of distinguishing features, but
the most striking is this second hole in its skull, a feature we have never
seen before in a North American dinosaur," said Peter Dodson, senior
author of the research study and anatomy professor at the university's
veterinary school.
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- The Jurassic-age find was first spotted by William Donawick,
emeritus professor of surgery at Penn's School of Veterinary Medicine,
while on a horseback ride in fall 1998 in far southern Montana, not far
from his daughter and son-in-law's Wyoming ranch. He returned to Philadelphia
with a piece of bone for his colleague Dodson, who found it tantalizing
enough that an expedition got under way the following summer.
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- Researchers have named the dinosaur Suuwassea emilieae
(SOO-oo-WAH-see-uh eh-MEE-LEE-aye), after a Crow Indian word meaning "ancient
thunder" and for the late Philadelphia socialite Emilie deHellebrath,
who funded the digs that unearthed more than 50 bones. They ranged from
a 43-inch shoulder blade and a 53-inch rib to the two-holed skull that
has scientists stumped.
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- "The extra hole in the skull is still a mystery,"
said Jerry Harris, study co-author and Penn graduate student researcher.
"It has only been seen before in two dinosaurs from Africa and one
from South America." While its Diplodocus relatives have a single
hole on the top of the skull for the nasal cavity, the purpose of Suuwassea's
second hole is unknown, he said.
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- The bones were unearthed in 1999 and 2000 but had to
be coaxed from their rocky enclosures, cleaned up and subjected to a lengthy
process of measurements, comparative studies, published papers and peer
review before passing muster as a new dinosaur, Dodson said. Suuwassea
emilieae's new home is the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia,
where it will be available for teachers, researchers and students to study.
It may even be assembled and displayed one day, said academy paleontologist
Ted Daeschler.
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- Suuwassea was found on what once was waterfront property
that looked onto a body of water called the Sundance Sea. The location
of the find is unusual, researchers said, because most of the dinosaur
bones have been found further south, in drier parts of a region that paleontologists
call the Morrison Formation. The fossil-rich area stretches from Montana
to New Mexico.
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- "It's from a time period and a place that makes
it relatively unique," Daeschler said.
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- Suuwassea emilieae is the first new sauropod found in
the Morrison Formation in more than a century, Dodson said, but many more
are likely to come as archaeological research continues to intensify.
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- "We're living now in a golden age of dinosaur paleontology,"
he said. "They're being found at a startling rate all over the world."
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