Curator interviewed about new horned dinosaur
Dr. Michael Ryan, curator of vertebrate paleontology, was interviewed by National Geographic about a new species of dinosaur that marks the oldest arrival of horned dinosaurs in North America.
Ryan explained the differences in size, shape and age of the Aquilops americanus compared to other ceratopsian dinosaur relatives such as Triceratops. He underscored the significance of the discovery to scientists’ work in unraveling the evolutionary history of early horned dinosaurs on this continent.
Aquilops was described based on a tiny fossil skull discovered in 1997 by a team of scientists that did not include Ryan. The new species description was published in the journal PLOS ONE Dec. 10, 2014.
Read the National Geographic news story here.