A New Dinosaur From Newsday

[Garrison Hilliard <garrison@efn.org>]

http://www.newsday.com/news/science/wire/sns-ap-india-dinosaurs,0,2591985.story 

New Dinosaur Species Found in India
   
   
  
    
By RAMOLA TALWAR BADAM
Associated Press Writer

August 13, 2003, 9:04 PM EDT

BOMBAY, India -- U.S. and Indian scientists said Wednesday they have discovered
a new carnivorous dinosaur species in India after finding bones in the western
part of the country. 

The new dinosaur species was named Rajasaurus narmadensis, or "Regal reptile
from the Narmada," after the Narmada River region where the bones were found. 

The dinosaurs were between 25-30 feet long, had a horn above their skulls, were
relatively heavy and walked on two legs, scientists said. They preyed on
long-necked herbivorous dinosaurs on the Indian subcontinent during the
Cretaceous Period at the end of the dinosaur age, 65 million years ago. 

"It's fabulous to be able to see this dinosaur which lived as the age of
dinosaurs came to a close," said Paul Sereno, a paleontologist at the University
of Chicago. "It was a significant predator that was related to species on
continental Africa, Madagascar and South America." 

Working with Indian scientists, Sereno and paleontologist Jeff Wilson of the
University of Michigan reconstructed the dinosaur skull in a project funded
partly by the National Geographic Society. 

A model of the assembled skull was presented Wednesday by the American
scientists to their counterparts from Punjab University in northern India and
the Geological Survey of India during a Bombay news conference. 

Scientists said they hope the discovery will help explain the extinction of the
dinosaurs and the shifting of the continents -- how India separated from Africa,
Madagascar, Australia and Antarctica and collided with Asia. 

The dinosaur bones were discovered during the past 18 years by Indian scientists
Suresh Srivastava of the Geological Survey of India and Ashok Sahni, a
paleontologist at Punjab University. 

When the bones were examined, "we realized we had a partial skeleton of an
undiscovered species," Sereno said. 

The scientists said they believe the Rajasaurus roamed the Southern Hemisphere
land masses of present-day Madagascar, Africa and South America. 

"People don't realize dinosaurs are the only large-bodied animal that lived,
evolved and died at a time when all continents were united," Sereno said. 

The cause of the dinosaurs' extinction is still debated by scientists. The
Rajasaurus discovery may provide crucial clues, Sereno said. 

India has seen quite a few paleontological discoveries recently. 

In 1997, villagers discovered about 300 fossilized dinosaur eggs in Pisdura, 440
miles northeast of Bombay, that Indian scientists said were laid by four-legged,
long-necked vegetarian creatures. 

Indian scientists said the dinosaur embryos in the eggs may have suffocated
during volcanic eruptions. 
Copyright © 2003, The Associated Press