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Rabat: German-Moroccan paleontologist Nizar Ibrahim has released new evidence that spinosaurus dinosaurs could swim, a controversial theory, using their tails to propel them through the water.
Studying the fossil of a “Spinosaurus aegyptiacus” tail that researchers found in eastern Morocco, Ibrahim concluded that the tail was “unequivocal evidence” of the ability to swim.
Along with his co-authors, Ibrahim argued in a Role of nature April 29 “Spinosaurus’ tail shape produces greater thrust and efficiency in water than terrestrial dinosaur tail shapes. “
Among paleontologists, the question of whether dinosaurs could swim has been controversial. Ibrahim has hypothesized for years that spinosaurus could swim because they had dense bones, paddle-like feet, and heads suitable for catching fish.
Ibrahim’s hypothesis was comparatively unique among the paleontologist community, where “historical proposals that some groups [of dinosaurs] they lived in aquatic environments they were abandoned decades ago. “
In a 2015 TED talk, Ibrahim explained how he arrived in Morocco “on a quest to discover new remains of a strange, giant, and predatory dinosaur named spinosaurus.”
As the name “Spinosaurus aegyptiacus” implies, the first person to record the animal’s fossils, Ernst Stromer, found them in Egypt. The fossils that Stromer found and reported in 1915 were destroyed later in World War II.
During extensive excavations in the Kem Kem beds in eastern Morocco, Ibrahim found several dinosaur fossils, but at first, “the spinosaurus itself proved to be very illusory.”
Read also: Morocco opens an investigation into the auction of dinosaur tail fossils in Mexico
However, after locating the dig site of a local fossil hunter, the team found some spinosaurus bones.
Especially after reconstructing the bones into a digital skeleton by scanning them with CT, Ibrahim believed he was looking at a “river monster”.
“When we looked at the digital skeleton, we realized that yes, it was a dinosaur like no other,” he said, explaining how its features pointed to its aquatic environment.
Although the Sahara is dry today, researchers believe it was a great river system in the cretaceous period.
Ibrahim encouraged further exploration, saying “I think the Sahara is still full of treasures.”
National Geographic named Nizar Ibrahim “Emerging Explorer” in 2014.
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