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Developing Saurolophus dino found at 'Dragon's Tomb'

Found with associated shell fragments, Saurolophus dino likely from nest, in earliest stages of development

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Developing <em>Saurolophus</em> Dino Found

image: Perinatal specimens of Saurolophus angustirostris (MPC-D100/764). Bones on the right side of the block show a certain degree of articulation, whereas bones on the left are disarticulated. view more 

Credit: Dewaele et al.

Scientists describe a perinatal group of Saurolophus angustirostris, a giant hadrosaur dinosaur, all likely from the same nest, found at "Dragon's Tomb" in Mongolia, according to a study published October 14, 2015 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Leonard Dewaele from Ghent University and the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, Belgium and colleagues.

Discovered in an area called the "Dragon's Tomb," a famous location for finding Late Cretaceous dinosaur fossils in the Gobi Desert, Mongolia, the authors of this study described three or four perinatal specimens or "babies" and two associated eggshell fragments. The young dinosaurs were likely part of a nest originally located on a river sandbank, and the authors suggest they are likely Saurolophus angustirostris (meaning 'lizard crest'), a dinosaur that is known from multiple well-preserved complete skeletons.

The skull length of these Saurolophus was around 5% that of the largest known S. angustirostris specimens, indicating that these specimens were in the earliest development stages. The perinatal bones already resembled S. angustirostris characteristics, including the upwardly directed snout (the premaxillary bones). The specimens did not yet have the characteristic cranial crest at the top of the head and areas of the skull-the cervical neural arches-were not yet fused, which suggest they may be in the earliest stages of the development of S. angustirostris.

Leonard Dewaele notes, "The poorly developed crest in Saurolophus babies provides evidence of ontogenetic crest growth within the Saurolophini tribe. The Saurolophini are the only Saurolophinae to bear supra cranial crests as adults."

Scientists can't tell whether the individuals were still in the eggs or had just hatched when they died, but they were apparently already dead and partly decomposed when they were buried by river sediment during the wet summer season. The fossilized eggshell fragments associated with the perinatal individuals closely resemble those found from S. angustirostris relatives in Mongolia, and scientists suggest these specimens may bridge a gap in our knowledge of the development of S. angustirostris.

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In your coverage please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper: http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0138806

Citation: Dewaele L, Tsogtbaatar K, Barsbold R, Garcia G, Stein K, Escuillié F, et al. (2015) Perinatal Specimens of Saurolophus angustirostris (Dinosauria: Hadrosauridae), from the Upper Cretaceous of Mongolia. PLoS ONE 10(10): e0138806. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0138806

Image Credit: Dewaele et al.

Funding: The author(s) received no specific funding for this work. Eldonia provided support in the form of a salary for FE, but did not have any additional role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The specific role of this author is articulated in the 'author contributions' section.

Competing Interests: François Escuillié is employed by Eldonia a company specializing in the preparation and casting of fossils. There are no patents, products in development or marketed products to declare. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials, as detailed online in the guide for authors.

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