Tyrannosaurus rex king , by name and nature , is the king of dinosaur . However , millions of years before the “ tyrant lounge lizard Riley B King ” stomped the Earth , another member of the tyrannosaurids ruled supreme , and it too has an awing name : Dynamoterror dynastes .
A young study , published in the journalPeerJ , has described this newly - discovered beast using fossilized remains found in the San Juan Basin of New Mexico by a squad lead by palaeontologists Andrew McDonald and Douglas Wolfe . It ’s estimated thatDynamoterrorwould have been about 9.1 meters ( 30 foot ) from snout to dog , close to 80 percentage the size of a fully - grownT. rex .
It ’s also among some of the earliest tyrannosaurids ever unearthed in North America . T. rex , live some 68 to 66 million years ago , while other Tyrannosaurs have even been dated to 77 million eld . These remains , however , are conceive to engagement back as far as around 80 million class ago . Back whenDynamoterror dynastesroamed the earth , this part of New Mexico was actually part of Laramidia , an island continent that exist during the Late Cretaceous menstruation , and played host to multiple handsome predators of the Tyrannosaurinae and Albertosaurinae home .
“ Although exceptionally rich , the tyrannosaurid platter from Laramidia is temporally restricted to between approximately 77 million twelvemonth ago and 66 million old age ago , obscuring the earlier phylogenesis of the group , ” the bailiwick generator write . As such , they believeDynamoterrorcould shed some light on how the tyrannosaurids evolve their notoriously large body size of it and institute themselves as the top predators of the day .
Most of this beast ’s remains were shattered , fragmented , and uncompleted , making it diabolically hard to study . However , the researchers were also in monomania of a relatively well - preserved span of frontal castanets from the individual ’s skull , allowing them to finally identify it as a new specie and a new genus .
They also used optical maser - scanning to make a composite 3D digital mannikin of the dinosaur ’s clappers , which you cancheck out in all their aura right here .
Like many members of the Tyrannosaur family , the newly identify mintage share another feature film : an intimidating name . It ’s fairly well known thatTyrannosaurusmeans something to the impression of “ tyrant lizard ” in Greek ( other awful name includeDiablosaurus ; “ devil horned nerve ” andStygimoloch ; “ demon from the river Styx ” ) . The fresh describe species , Dynamoterror dynastes , slackly translates to mean “ powerful threat ruler . ” Bad . Ass .
