Author: Robby Berman / Source: Big Think
- Hatchling, four-year-old, and adult models show us new sides of the famous predator.
- They’re part of the T. rex: The Ultimate Predator exhibit running from March 2019 to August 2020.
- Attention time travelers: You may want to pet the feathered hatchling. Don’t.
There’s no doubt that the adult Tyrannosaurus Rex was a fearsome predator, with a powerful bite that could cause the head of a victim to explode from sheer force. Of course, much of what we’ve longed “known” about T. rex is informed speculation based on incomplete information. However, paleontologists at New York’s American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) are about to unveil the result of a remarkable project.
They’ve constructed stunning models of the T. rex as a hatchling, as a four-year-old, and as an adult based on the latest discoveries and thinking. Their intent is to provide the most scientifically accurate renderings ever of the T. rex as part of their “T. rex: The Ultimate Predator“exhibit running from March 11, 2019 to August 9, 2020.
The biggest surprise? The hatchling. Who ever thought a T. rex could be so, well, crazy-cute!?
Latest fossil discoveries
Image source: AMNH/AMNH / R. Peterson
As more fossils are discovered, we learn more and more about the Tyrannosauroidea family. The first discovery of a feathered dinosaur, the Sinosauropteryx prima in 1996, suggested we might’ve been picturing the ancient creatures, including T. rex, incorrectly. More recent discoveries such as the Yutyrannus huali have only bolstered this suspicion. In addition, archeologists have begun finding infant Tyrannousaur fossils, and this has allowed the team at the AMNH, led by Mark Norell, to realistically imagine T. rex at three life stages for the “Ultimate Predator” exhibit.
Not all Tyrannosaurs were T. rexes — there were dozens of Tyrannosaur species, and no others were as large. The Ultimate Predator show includes a number of them, including the Dilong paradoxus. Most were about the size of a T. rex hatchling as adults. They were all, however, all dangerous predators — and the AMNH exhibit will feature new representations of a variety of family members. Most Tyrannousaurs were fast runners, unlike the adolescent and adult T. rex, a slower-moving death machine. (The hatchling ran.)
Informed guesswork
There’s still a fair amount of conjecture involved, but between what’s visible in the fossil record and what…
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