New predatory dinosaur added to Australia's prehistory
Source: phys.org
Date: 31 January, 2020
Evidence of agile, carnivorous two-legged dinosaurs known as noasaurids have been found across the now dispersed land masses that once formed the ancient southern supercontinent of Gondwana, but never in Australia—until now.
Researchers identified a single neck bone found in an opal mine near the outback town of Lightning Ridge, New South Wales, as belonging to a noasaurid, and then realised that another fossil discovered in 2012 along the south coast of Victoria was from the same group.
Noasaurid are a rare group of theropod dinosaurs—two legged carnivores—that lived in the middle to late Cretaceous Period, between about 120 and 66 million years ago. Noasaurids were small-bodied dinosaurs, many with peculiar facial features, typically less than two metres long and weighing about 20 kilograms.
The recognition of this new group of dinosaurs in Australia by palaeontologists from the Palaeoscience Research Centre at the University of New England and the Australian Opal Centre in Lightning Ridge adds a missing piece to a puzzle.
"It was assumed that noasaurids must have lived in Australia because their fossils have been found on other southern continents that, like Australia, were once part of the Gondwanan supercontinent," said lead scientist, Dr. Tom Brougham of the Palaeoscience Research Centre. "These recent fossil finds demonstrate for the first time that noasaurids once roamed across Australia. Discoveries of theropods are rare in Australia, so every little find we make reveals important details about our unique dinosaur fauna."
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