This 'incredibly unusual' dinosaur roamed in Mississippi more than 80 million years ago

For the first time, the palaeontologists stumbled upon a mostly completedinosaurfossil buried in Mississippi, which has been called “incredibly unusual” by officials and is still 85 per cent buried from the time it was found in 2007.

The specimen was identified by the palaeontologists as ahadrosaur, which belongs to a family of duck-billed, herbivorous dinosaurs. These dinosaurs existed on Earth more than 82 million years ago.

In the hadrosaur family, there are at least 61 identified species and probably hundreds more that once roamed the Earth.

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The portions of the forearm, feet, pelvic bones and spinal vertebrae of this dinosaur fossil were unearthed by the researchers.

The palaeontologists are, however, finding it challenging to extract the rest of the fossil from its location close to Booneville in northeast Mississippi.

“This thing sat for a while because we didn’t have anybody to work on it,” said James Starnes, who is an official with the geology office of the state.

The hadrosaur fossil of this specific species has remained unidentified for nearly two decades.

A 3D method of forensic bone analysis, known as geometric morphometrics, is now being used by researchers to understand the fossil before it is fully unearthed.

The University of Southern Mississippi(USM) geology graduate student Derek Hoffman has been analysing the remains of the hadrosaur with the method.

“What geometric morphometrics does is it takes a shape-analysis approach,” he said.

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The method helps in understanding the ‘landmarks’ or key features of a bone sample and holds comparisons between their distances and ratios through complex statistical models for identifying the similarities and differences with the known bones.

The work of Hoffman has been complicated because a few pieces of thefossilare with private collectors. The research is primarily focused on the bones kept by theMississippi Museum of Natural Science.

“We have quite a few of thevertebrae,” stated Museum palaeontology curator George Phillips. “We have one humerus. We have one ulna. The ulna is the posterior of the forearm. We have some of the foot bones. Then we have the pubis," he added.

The ulna of adult hadrosaur is nearly two feet long and the humerus is about a foot and a half. In total weight, the foot bones of a complete adult hadrosaur can exceed 50 pounds.

(With inputs from agencies)