Reuters: unearthed one of the best preserved dinosaurs found

[Don Lamson <dlamson@iea.com>]

         Release at 2 P.M. EST
            By Patricia Reaney
            LONDON (Reuters) - Italian paleontologists said Wednesday
they had unearthed one of the best preserved dinosaurs found
anywhere in the world, complete with internal organs and
muscles.
            The young theropod, named Scipionyx samniticus, is more than

110 million years old and is a distant cousin of Tyrannosaurus
rex, the king of all carnivores.
            ``It is the first of its kind -- the first time soft parts
(internal organs and muscles) are so represented in dinosaurs,''
Marco Signore of Britain's Bristol University told Reuters.
            ``This is unique not only for soft tissues but this is the
first time a dinosaur has been found in Italy. Until three years
ago no geologist here even supposed that dinosaurs could be
found here. It should mark a new point for Italian geology,'' he
said in a telephone interview from Naples.
            Signore and Cristiano dal Sasso, of the Museo Civico di
Storia Naturale in Milan, found the hatchling specimen in the
Matese mountains north of Naples. Although it is an area rich in
invertebrate fossils and fish no one imagined it contained
dinosaur remains.
            The Italian remains show the creature's windpipe, large
intestine and bits of liver. In a report in the scientific
journal Nature, Signore said the tissues of the 13-inch-long
specimen were better preserved than those in dinosaurs found in
Brazil and China.
            He said the theropod could be a new genus and possibly a new

family of dinosaur but paleontologists were not sure yet.
            Scientists have described about 350 species of dinosaurs.
The fearsome creatures lived for 165 million years before they
mysteriously disappeared 65 million years ago.
            Some scientists believe their demise was due to global
cooling after an asteroid crashed into the Earth and flung
pulverized rock and debris into the atmosphere.
            The discovery of dinosaur bones has taught scientists a lot
about the creatures, but examples of soft tissue are extremely
rare. Signore's lizard-like hatchling specimen is shown lying on
its left side with the head slightly upturned.
            The discovery will give scientists new insights into
paleobiology -- how dinosaur hatchlings developed and how they
were cared for. Signore also hopes it will help him and his
colleagues to compile a complete account of the dinosaur's soft
parts.
            ``This is absolutely the best record of dinosaurs in Italy,
maybe in Europe,'' he said.

 ^REUTERS@