One of the Best-Preserved Dinosaurs Of All Time Found in Canada - ExtremeTech:
Professor Brian Pickles and paleontologist Caleb Brown stand next to the exposed parts of their newly-discovered fossil. (Photo: Melissa Dergousoff/University of Reading)When we think of dinosaur fossils, we often think of footprints preserved in sandstone, or bones carefully displayed inside a museum. But what about mummified dinosaurs? That's what researchers think they've found lodged into a hillside in Alberta, Canada.
Professor Brian Pickles, a paleontologist at the United Kingdom's University of Reading, recently led a scouting trip at Alberta's Dinosaur Provincial Park. [...] when he and his team saw what appeared to be a full "dinosaur mummy" sticking out of the hillside.
An excavation mission followed. The mummy's exposed parts included a foot and part of a tail covered in fossilized skin. The dinosaur is so well-preserved that the researchers were able to make out individual scales and tendons. If the rest of the fossil is as well-preserved as the exposed bits, the researchers might even be able to examine the dinosaur's internal organs, as well as its stomach contents to determine what its last meal was.
[...] "This animal probably either died and then immediately got covered over by sand and silt in the river," Pickles told USA Today. "Or it was killed because a river bank fell onto it." Pickles went on to say that because dinosaurs grew very quickly, it's less common to find fossilized juveniles. This specific subset is important as it offers researchers insight into how dinosaurs' lives developed with age.
(Score: 2, Touché) by khallow on Sunday September 25 2022, @04:21AM (2 children)
(Score: 3, Funny) by driverless on Sunday September 25 2022, @01:01PM (1 child)
You don't have to go back any time at all, Congress is packed full of the best-preserved dinosaurs. In fact it's pretty much a requirement to be a senator, and certainly president.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Sunday September 25 2022, @11:00PM
No, this is Canada, so the fossils are MPs, not senators.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1, Funny) by end rant on Sunday September 25 2022, @05:34AM (1 child)
What an amazing find for Brown Pickles!
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2022, @09:48AM
That's Professor Pickles, to you.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Sunday September 25 2022, @03:14PM
The park where the fossil was discovered is one of the best places in the hell Creek formation to see and discover dinosaur fossils. They have trails with enclosures built over half-excavated dinosaurs so you can see better how they are found and uncovered. You can also camp in the middle of the valley where there's so little light pollution at night that you can see the milky way and the whole plane feels primordial.
Washington DC delenda est.