Argentinian paleontologists found a T-Rex-like dinosaur and name him after a dragon from Game of Thrones

(Artist reprensetation of M. gigas / Jorge A. Gonzalez. https://bit.ly/3uw1Fm3)

Jurassic World meets Game of Thrones. A group of paleontologists have discovered the fossils of a 4-ton carnivorous dinosaur in Argentina .

The team, led by Juan I. Canale of the Ernesto Bachmann Paleontological Museum, has named the dinosaur Meraxes gigas, in honor of a dragon from Game of Thrones.

The dragon technically appears in A Song of Ice and Fire, the book where the famous TV show is based on.

Carcharodontosauridae is a family of carnivorous dinosaurs that includes some of the largest theropods, such as Carcharodontosaurus and Giganotosaurus.

Carcharodontosaurids became extinct at the end of the Turonian age (about 89.8 million years ago).

They left the niche of apex predators for tyrannosaurids in the Northern Hemisphere, and for abelisaurids and megaraptors in the Southern Hemisphere.

Now Canale and his colleagues from the US and Canada have described a new carcharodontosaurid from the Southern Hemisphere.

They found fossils, including a nearly complete skull and forelimb bones, in Cenomanian deposits (100.5 to 93.9 million years ago) of the Huincul Formation in Argentina.

The paleontologists named the dinosaur Meraxes gigas. The generic name is in honor of the dragon Meraxes from A Song of Ice and Fire, and the specific name translates to "giant".

M. gigas was a large predator, the scientists estimated its mass at 4263 kilograms.

(Discovered bones / Juan I. Canale et al - Current Biology, 2022 https://bit.ly/3yqqGQB)

Canale’s team note that the dinosaur is the only Late Cretaceous carcharodontosaurid with well-preserved forelimb bones.

The fossils suggest that the length of his arms was only 47% of the length of the femur. very similar to the advanced tyrannosaurids and abelisaurids.

Thus, the decrease in forelimbs during evolution occurred independently in three lineages of giant theropods.

The authors also analyzed the histological structure of the bones of M. gigas and concluded that they belonged to a very old individual.

The predator was between 39 and 53 years old at the time of death.

Right now it is impossible to estimate its age more accurately, the paleontologists need fossils of other individuals, especially younger ones.

This is the oldest individual among all known non-avian theropods and one of the oldest among all dinosaurs. M. gigas was even older than the T-Rex.

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There are some pretty cool artistic representations from the dino and Meraxes the dragon, but I can't upload them here because you know... rules. You can google them, tho.

Source:

• Current Biology: https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(22)00860-0
• New Scientists: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2327658-meraxes-gigas-was-a-huge-dinosaur-with-tiny-arms-like-t-rex/
• Conicet: https://www.conicet.gov.ar/hallan-en-neuquen-un-dinosaurio-carnivoro-gigante-del-cretacico-superior/

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