Scientists in China have unearthed a prehistoric geek, a dinosaur that looks like a cross between ferocious Tyrannosaurus Rex and a bunny rabbit. The beast walked on two legs and was related to the big meat eaters, but this creature was a vegetarian with the prominent front teeth of a rabbit.
The find was made in the Yixian Formation in northeastern China, a rock formation that has yielded a remarkable range of outlandish looking animals. Details of the discovery are published this morning in the journal, Nature.
The Yixian Formation has given us a large collection of spectacular fossils including dinosaurs with feathers. The newcomer, Incisivosaurus gauthieri, is just as odd, with the buckteeth of a rabbit mounted in a parrot-like beak.
The fossils date back to the Early Cretaceous 128 million years ago according to Xing Xu of the Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Paleoanthropology in Beijing. Classed as an oviraptor, the small, two-legged animal is distantly related to the flashier carnivores including the giant T-rex and the velociraptors made famous by the Jurassic Park films. All similarity stops there, however, as Incisivosaurus was strictly into greens.
It had two prominent front teeth similar to those of a rodent and plenty of others behind. Study of these showed however that meat was not on the animal's menu.
"These dental features were previously unknown among theropods [two-legged dinosaurs] and suggest a herbivorous diet," the authors note.
Yet while many oviraptors are linked to modern birds given their bone structure, the newcomer is non-avian, the authors note. It had a low skull and toothed jaws more akin to the typical theropod.
Unfortunately for the Incisivosaurus, it also looks remarkably like our modern portrayal of a geek. The only things missing are the black-rimmed glasses and plastic protector for the shirt pocket.