New dinosaur species found in Japan; had massive sword-like claws

Palaeontologists have unearthed a new genus of therizinosaurid dinosaur that lived during the Cretaceous period in Hokkaido, the northern island of Japan.

Dubbed Paralitherizinosaurus japonicus, this new species of dinosaur roamed around the shores of Asia between 66 million and 145 million years ago.

The most remarkable aspect of this species is that it had sword-like claws, like Edward Scissorhands, which were used not for eviscerating animal preybut rather to slash vegetation as it was a herbivore species, the study said.

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This dinosaur belonged to a group known as therizinosaurs — bipedal and primarily herbivorous three-toed dinosaurs that lived during the Cretaceous period.

“[This dinosaur] used its claws as foraging tools, rather than tools of aggression, to draw shrubs and trees closer to its mouth to eat," study co-author Anthony Fiorillo, a research professor in the Roy M. Huffington Department of Earth Sciences at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas, told Live Science.

"We believe it died on land and was washed out to sea."

The fossil was found by researchers from Japan and the United States in 2008. They had described it as the youngest therizinosaur fossil ever found in the Asian country. It also happens to be the first to be found in Asia in marine sediments.

The fossil was encased in a concretion — a hardened mineral deposit — and at the time of its discovery,

The hook-shaped fossil, which includes a partial vertebra and a partial wrist and forefoot, is kept in the collections at the Nakagawa Museum of Natural History in Hokkaido, Japan.

Initially, it was believed to belong to a therizinosaur, but due to a lack of comparative data at the time, the original researchers were unable to draw any definitive conclusions, representatives of Hokkaido University said in a statement.

However, new data from many other fossils that were discovered since that time have helped with classifying the fossil based on the shape of the forefoot claw. This prompted a new team of palaeontologists to revisit the specimen to get some definitive answers.

Based on their analysis, the authors of the new study concluded that the fossil, which measures just under 4 inches (10 centimetres) in length, belonged to a therizinosaur that lived approximately 80 million to 82 million years ago, the statement said.

The findings were published online on May 3 in the journalScientific Reports.

(With inputs from agencies)

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