DISCOVERY! Dinosaur with giant, horned headpiece named after iconic Norse god

 Here's a story about the discovery of a "new" dinosaur -well, one that wasn't known about before that roamed the earth 78 million years ago. 

(Image: The horned dinosaur Lokiceratops rangiformis inhabited the wetlands of what is now Montana 78 million years ago.FABRIZIO LAVEZZI/EVOLUTIONSMUSEET, KNUTHENBORG) 

Newfound dinosaur with giant, horned headpiece named after iconic Norse god 

  By Harry Baker LIVE SCIENCE, June 21, 2024 

Paleontologists have named a newly unearthed dinosaur after the Norse god Loki due to a striking similarity between its horns and the deity's regal headpiece, as it was depicted in recent superhero films and television shows.

 The researchers identified the species based on the partial remains of a skull unearthed in 2019 at the Judith River Formation in Montana's Badlands, around 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from the U.S.-Canada border.

About 78 million years ago, a peculiar-looking dinosaur roamed the swamps and wetlands of what is now Montana. The huge plant eater boasted a splendid frill on its head, topped with spikes and two large horns which curved downward like blades. Two more horns jutted out from above its eyes. The dinosaur, described for the first time today in PeerJ, is so distinctive that researchers have declared it a new species and given it a name: Lokiceratops rangiformis, after the blade-wielding Norse god Loki.

(Image: The reconstructed skull of Lokiceratops rangiformis is now on display at the Museum of Evolution in Maribo, Denmark.MUSEUM OF EVOLUTION/MARIBO DENMARK) 

The species belongs to the clade Ceratopsia — a group of herbivorous horned dinosaurs, including Triceratops, that is renowned for its members' large bony head plates, or frills, and long, pointed horns.

However, L. rangiformis, which was likely around 22 feet (6.7 meters) long and weighed 5.5 tons (5 metric tons), "pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear" to extremes never seen before, study co-lead author Joseph Sertich, a paleontologist at Colorado State University, said in a statement.

L. rangiformis had a massive frill that was adorned with a pair of flattened, curvy horns at the top, in addition to the standard lance-like horns protruding from above its eyes. The frill horns are the largest ever seen in any ceratopsian. The unique headgear inspired the scientists to name the dinosaur's genus Lokiceratops in honor of the Norse trickster god Loki, who is often depicted wearing a helmet with similarly ornate horns — especially in modern comic-book portrayals by Marvel.

The newfound species also had a third pair of asymmetrical horns at the top of its frill, which earned it the species name rangiformis, meaning "looks like caribou" in Latin, because caribous (Rangifer tarandus) also have antlers that are longer on one side of their head than the other.

The dinosaur's skull also notably lacks a nose horn, a feature most other ceratopsians possess, including Triceratops.

Big Discovery! DINOSAUR FOSSILS FROM 76 MILLION YEARS AGO WITH INTACT SKIN IN CANADA

Researchers in Canada have discovered parts of what they believe to be a full "dinosaur mummy" lodged in a hillside, the University of Reading in the United Kingdom announced in the beginning of March. Here's the story:

(Photo: Paleontologist Brian Pickles and colleague at the cite of the two exposed fossils, a foot and part of a tail clad in fossilized skin, are believed to belong to a juvenile duck-billed Hadrosaur dinosaur

DINOSAUR FOSSILS FROM 76 MILLION YEARS AGO WITH INTACT SKIN IN CANADA

The Archaeologist Blog, March 5, 2023 

The two exposed fossils, a foot and part of a tail clad in fossilized skin, are believed to belong to a juvenile duck-billed Hadrosaur dinosaur that died somewhere between 77 million to 75 million years ago, roughly 10 million years before dinosaurs went extinct, researchers said. Scientists began excavation of the site to remove the entire remains from the hill.

“It’s so well preserved you can see the individual scales, we can see some tendons and it looks like there’s going to be skin over the entire animal,” Brian Pickles, a paleontologist and ecology professor at the University of Reading, told USA TODAY. “Which means, if we’re really lucky, then some of the other internal organs might have preserved as well.”

If the remains are in as good of shape as Pickles hopes, it would be one of the best preserved dinosaur fossils ever discovered and would provide scientists with a clearer picture of what the dinosaur looked like when it roamed the Earth.

In the best case scenario, the creature’s stomach contents might be preserved, allowing scientists to determine the animal’s last meal, Pickles said.

(Image: A Hadrosaur. Credit: Dr. Brian Pickles)

'Perfectly preserved'

A member of a field team led by Pickles, paleontologist Caleb Brown of Canada’s Royal Tyrrell Museum and scientists the University of New England in Australia first spotted the fossil poking out of a cliffside while on a scouting trip for an international field school last year at the Dinosaur Provincial Park in Alberta, Canada.

“It’s hard to imagine. This animal died 76 million years ago. It’s been perfectly preserved since then and it just happened to be just starting to erode out of this cliff when we were walking by,” Pickles said.

"This animal probably either died and then immediately got covered over by sand and silt in the river," Pickles said. "Or it was killed because a river bank fell onto it."

Hadrosaur fossils are common in North America, but finding juveniles is rare.

“Dinosaurs actually grew quite quickly so finding juveniles in the fossil record is important because it can tell us a lot about how their lives progressed,” Pickles said.

Pickles estimates the dinosaur to be about 13 feet long, around the length of a car. Adult Hadrosaurs were about 32 feet long, Pickles said.

It’s too early to identify the exact species. Scientists will need to analyze the skull, Pickles said. Even then, the skull may look different than anything in the record since the animal was still in its developing years. 

 MORE: https://www.thearchaeologist.org/blog/dinosaur-fossils-from-76-million-years-ago-with-intact-skin-in-canada