Dinosaurs

It isn't hard to imagine the world full of dinosaurs, even though these extinct animals haven't walked the earth for millions of years. Learn all about dinosaurs, including early dinosaur discoveries, dinosaur fossils, and dinosaur extinction.

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Brachiosaurus has been portrayed in popular culture many times, but the representations of this mysterious dinosaur are largely based on another massive dino called Giraffatitan brancai.

By Mark Mancini

Diplodocus was an incredibly large dinosaur. It is the longest dinosaur known from complete skeletons. A fully grown adult could reach a length of 90 feet. Skeletons of this massive dinosaur have been found in North America.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Huayangosaurus was a type of stegosaur that lived in the Middle Jurassic in what is now China. The most prominent feature on this dinosaur is the rows of bony plating that ran down its back.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

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Supersaurus was a dinosaur that truly deserved its name. It measured about 100 feet in length and lived in North America. This dinosaur lived on a diet that consisted mostly of chutes and leaves from the tops of trees.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Acrocanthosaurus was a sauropod of spectacular proportions. In some ways it looked like many other meat-eating dinosaurs, but it had a sail along its back. See pictures and learn more about this dinosaur.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Carnotaurus (its name means "meat bull") is known from a single, nearly complete skeleton that had skin impressions over much of the skull and body. Read more about this South American dinosaur's unusual features.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

The 1964 discovery of Deinonychus in southern Montana was groundbreaking for many reasons, mostly because it helped prove that birds are direct descendants of dinosaurs.

By Mark Mancini

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Discovered in 1966 in Niger is africa, this new dinosaur was first named and studied in 1976. Its name means "brave reptile." See why it is one of the most puzzling large ornithopods of the Cretaceous.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Tenontosaurus was a medium-size ornithopod dinosaur from Montana and Wyoming. Skeletons range in size from very small juveniles to almost 22-foot-long adults. Learn more about how this dinosaur lived and what it ate.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

The oldest record of a fossil dinosaur bones discovery is in a Chinese book written between 265 and 317 A.D. Learn more about dinosaur discoveries and the places they were made in this article.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Dinosaur evolution looks at how dinosaurs developed and changed over the course of time. Paleontologists study the different types of dinosaurs and how they are related to each other. How else is dinosaur evolution studied?

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

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Dinosaurs became extinct at the end of the Cretaceous Period. How and why is a puzzle that paleontologists are trying to solve by studying fossils and rock formations. Learn more about the different extinction theories.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Interest in dinosaurs soared to new heights in the 1990s, thanks largely to the blockbuster film Jurassic Park. So too did dinosaur discoveries. Since 1990, more than 100 new dinosaur genera have been described and named. Learn more about recent dinosaur discoveries.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Bagaceratops rozhdestvenskyi was a small protoceratopsian with a big name: "baga" is the Mongolian word for "small," "ceratops" means "horned face," and the species name is in honor of Russian paleontologist A. K. Rozhdestvensky. Learn more about Late Cretaceous dinosaurs.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Centrosaurus, which means "sharp-point reptile," was named by Lawrence Lambe in 1902 from specimens found along the Red Deer River in Alberta. A number of complete skulls and skeletons have since been discovered. Learn more about the Centrosaurus.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

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Corythosaurus, the "corinthian helmet reptile," was one of the most abundant duckbilled dinosaurs from the Late Cretaceous of western North America. Originally found and named by Barnum Brown of the American Museum of Natural History, Corythosaurus is also one of the best known of all dinosaurs.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Dromiceiomimus ("emu mimic") has been found both in the Late Cretaceous Horseshoe Canyon and the Judith River Formation of Alberta. It is very similar to Struthiomimus and Ornithomimus, but had much larger eyes and longer, more slender arms. Learn more about the Dromiceiomimus.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Since it was named in 1979 by John Horner and Robert Makela, Maiasaura has become one of the most famous dinosaurs. It has provided information about how it cared for its young and the early development of dinosaurs. Learn more about the Maiasaura.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Known from only a single skull and jaw from Montana and three teeth from South Dakota, Nanotyrannus was first thought to be an Albertosaurus. But it was recently redescribed because it was different in many ways from Albertosaurus.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

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Panoplosaurus is known only from two partial skeletons, one of which preserves some of the armor the way it was in life. This skeleton shows that Panoplosaurus was unusual among nodosaurids because it did not have spikes on the sides of its neck.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Parasaurolophus was an interesting-looking dinosaur. While it looked normal from the neck down, it looked almost as if it had a trombone on its head. And in a way, it did.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Pinacosaurus was one of the first armored dinosaurs found in Asia. An expedition from the American Museum of Natural History went to Mongolia to search for traces of early man; instead they found dinosaur eggs and skeletons.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

An almost complete skull and most of the skeleton were found for Prenocephale. It was collected during the Joint Polish-Mongolian Expeditions to the Gobi Desert. The animal was named and described in 1974.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

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Protoceratops andrewsi was discovered in Mongolia in 1922 by an expedition from the American Museum of Natural History led by Roy Chapman Andrews. Its genus name means "first-horned face," and its species name was in honor of the expedition's leader.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.

Segnosaurus galbinensis, or "slow lizard from Galbin" (a region of the Gobi Desert), was first described by Mongolian paleontologist Altangerel Perle in 1979. It was an unusual saurischian that he classified in its own family, the Segnosauridae.

By the Editors of Publications International, Ltd.