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Scientists unearth largest ever plant-eating dinosaur

Last Updated 03 May 2018, 06:23 IST

Dubbed the Angolatitan adamastor, or Angolan giant, it is believed to be part of a previously unknown dinosaur, the Daily Mail reported. The skeletons of the creature were found in an area that would have been underwater when the dinosaur was alive 90 million years ago, the researchers said.

It is believed that the remains, found with fish and shark teeth, might have been washed into the sea and torn apart by ancient sharks. Matthew Bonnan, a sauropod expert at Western Illinois University, said he believed the team's claim to have discovered a new dinosaur is genuine.

"I think they've been very careful," he said, adding the find could add to knowledge about how sauropods, or the lizard-hipped dinosaurs, adapted to different environments. Dr Bonnan said it was "really cool" to see research coming out of Angola and the "neat thing about dinosaur paleontology is that it's becoming more global".

"The more people and places that we involve in science, the better off we all are," he added. Angola has witnessed a long anti-colonial war followed by a civil war since its independence from Portugal in 1975. The fighting ended in 2002.

Dr Octavio Mateus, of Portugal's Universidade Nova de Lisboa and Museum of Lourinha, who led the excavation project in Angola said lack of money has been the greatest barrier to research. The findings were published in the journal Annals of the Brazilian Academy of Science.

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(Published 17 March 2011, 10:12 IST)

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