New predatory dinosaur species found in UK changes view of origins
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Paleontologists in the UK identified a new species of dinosaur, Invictibellatrix amberina, from a fossilized braincase held by the Natural History Museum in London for a century.
The dinosaur lived around 120 million years ago during the Early Cretaceous period on what is now the Isle of Wight. Researchers believe Invictibellatrix amberina was a megaraptoran, a group of agile, two-legged carnivores previously thought to mainly live in the southern hemisphere.
The newly identified species was relatively small for a megaraptoran, estimated to be 3 to 4 meters long and weighing around 200 to 300 kg, similar in size to Timurlengia. This suggests that megaraptorans did not always have large body sizes, with larger sizes evolving later in the group’s history. Scientists think Invictibellatrix amberina hunted smaller dinosaurs, lizards, and mammals, filling a similar ecological role to modern hyenas.
This discovery provides the first evidence of megaraptorans in Europe and supports a theory that the group originated in Asia before spreading to Europe and then into Africa and the southern continents like South America and Australia. The oldest megaraptoran fossils were previously found in the southern hemisphere, leading to debate about how they dispersed across the globe. Researchers published their findings in the journal Royal Society Open Science.
