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Retired doctor discovers new dinosaur with a honkin' big schnozz
2021-11-15 00:00:00
Jeremy Lockwood is a retired medical doctor who decided to spend his lockdown getting a PhD. With nothing else to do in a pandemic, he got to sorting through a box of iguanodon parts from the Natural History Museum of London that had been discovered on the Isle of Wight — and in the process, stumbled on a uniquely bulbous nasal bone. From The Guardian:
"For over 100 years, we'd only seen two types of dinosaur on the Isle of Wight – the plant-eating Iguanodon bernissartensis and Mantellisaurus atherfieldensis," he said. "I was convinced that subtle differences between bones would reveal a new species, so I set out to measure, photograph and study the anatomy of each bone."
After four years of unpacking and studying boxes of bones, he began reconstructing the skull of a specimen that had been in storage since 1978 and found several striking features that set it apart.
"The number of teeth was a sign," Lockwood said. "Mantellisaurus has 23 or 24, but this has 28. It also had a bulbous nose, whereas the other species have very straight noses. Altogether, these and other small differences made it very obviously a new species."
He added: "This discovery made it one of the happiest days of lockdown."
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