Ted_topic7:how we unearthed the Spinosaurus

by Nizar Ibrahim

A 50-foot-long carnivore who hunted it prey in rivers, million years ago, the Spinosaurus was a "dragon from deep time." Paleontologist Nizar Ibrahim and his crew found new fossils, hidden in cliffs of the Moroccan Sahara desert, that is Hel Ping us learn more about the first swimming dinosaur-who might also is the largest carnivorous dinosaur of all.

# Background about our speaker

Nizar Ibrahim scours(search everywhere, scrub (laboriously)) Northern Africa for clues to what things were like there in the Cretaceous Period(Cretaceous). A-TED Fellow, he has spearheaded(lead; pioneer) The recent search for the semi-aquatic(semi-aquatic) dinosaur Spinosaurus(Spine dragon).

# Why you should listen

paleontologist(paleontology) Nizar Ibrahim, a postdoc(postdoctoral) at the University of Chicago, wanted to uncover the Mystery of the Spinosaurus, a bizarre, gigantic predatory dinosaur whose only known remains(remnants; remains) were Lost during World War II After identifying a new skeleton at a dig on North Africa, Ibrahim made the landmark(adj. Significant or influential) conclusion that the Spinosaurus may has been the largest carnivorous dinosaur to ever live. Its crocodile-like head, dense bones(dense bone), short legs, and wide, paddle feet suggest it was a water dweller Unlik e any other. "The entire skeleton has water-loving River monster written all over it," he says.

# Video Address

https://www.ted.com/talks/nizar_ibrahim_how_we_unearthed_the_spinosaurus#

#Subtitles and Transcript

These dragons from the deep time is incredible creatures. They ' re bizzarre, they ' re beautiful, and there ' s very little we know about them.

These thoughts were going through my head when I am looked at the pages of my first dinosaur book. I was on five years old at the time, and I decided there and then that I would become a paleontologist. Paleontology allowed me to combine my love for animals and my desire to travel to far-flung corners of the world.

And now, a few years later, I ' ve led several expeditions(for purposes of adventure) organized travel, short trips) to the Ultimate(Ultimate, Ultimate far-flung(distant; wide; corner) on this planet, the Sahara. I ' ve worked in the Sahara because I ' ve been on a quest to (search, quest) uncover new remains of a bizarre, giant predator Y dinosaurcalled Spinosaurus.

A Few bones of this animal has been found in the deserts of Egypt and were described on years ago by a German pale Ontologist. Unfortunately, all he spinosaurus bones were destroyed in world War Ii. So all we ' re left with is just a few drawings and notes.

From these drawings, we know the this creature, which lived on million years ago, was very big, it had tall spines On its back, forming a magnificent sail, and it had long, slender jaws(mouth; slit; throat), a bit like a crocodile, with conical(conical; conical) Teeth,that may has been used to catch slippery(cunning) prey, like fish. But that is pretty much all we knew on this animal for the next years.

My fieldwork (field work, field work, field fortifications, field investigation) took me to the border region between Morocco (Morocco) and Algeria (. Algeria), a place called the Kem Kem. It ' s a difficult place-to-work in. Deal with sandstorms and Snakes and Scorpions (Scorpion), and it ' s very difficult to find good fossils there. But we hard work paid off. We discovered many incredible specimens . There ' s the largest dinosaur bone that had ever been found in this part of the Sahara. We found remains of giant predatory dinosaurs, medium-sized predatory dinosaurs, and seven or eight different kinds of crocodile-like hunters.

These fossils were deposited in a river system. The river system is also home to a giant, car-sized coelacanth(empty spiny fish), a monster sawfish(SAW), and the ski Es over the river system were filled with pterosaurs(Wing hand dragon), flying Reptiles(reptile). It is a pretty dangerous place and not the kind of place where you ' d want to travel to if you had a time machine.

So we ' re finding all these incredible fossils of animals that lived alongside Spinosaurus, but Spinosaurus itself proved t o be very elusive(shadowy). We were just finding bits and pieces and I was hoping, we ' d find a partial skeleton at some point.

Finally, very recently, we were able to trace down (found) a dig site (archaeological excavation site) where a local fossil hunter Found several bones of Spinosaurus. We returned to the site and we collected more bones. And so after the years we finally had another partial skeleton of this bizarre creature. And we were able to reconstruct it.

We now know this Spinosaurus had a head a little bit like a crocodile, very different from other predatory dinosaurs,ve Ry different from the T. Rex (Tyrannosaurus rex). But the really interesting information came from the rest of the skeleton. We had long spines, the spines forming the big sail. We had leg bones, we had skull bones, we had paddle-shaped (shape such as paddle) feet, wide feet--again, very unusual, no other D Inosaur has feet like this--and we think they may have been used to walk on soft sediment (deposition; sediment), or maybe for U>paddling (stroke with paddle; travel in water) in the water. We also looked at the fine microstructure of the bone, the inside structure of Spinosaurus bones, and it turns off that th EY ' re very dense and compact. Again, this is something we see in animals that spend a lot of time in the water, it's useful for buoyancy control ( Buoyancy regulation, buoyancy control) in the water.

We c.t.-scanned All of our bones and built a digital Spinosaurus skeleton. And when we are looked at the digital Skeleton,we realized Yes, this is a dinosaur unlike any other. It's bigger than a T. rex, and yes, the head has "fish-eating" written all over it, but really the entire skeleton have "WA Ter-loving "written all over it--dense bone, paddle-like feet, and the hind limbs(hind legs) is reduced in size, and Again, this is something we see in animals that spend a substantial amount of time in the water.

So, as we fleshedout (leap off, enrich, materialize) our Spinosaurus--I ' m looking at muscle attachments(attachment) and Wrappin G our dinosaur in skins--we realize that we ' re dealing with a river monster, a predatory dinosaur, bigger than T. rex, Th E ruler of this ancient river of giants, feeding on the many aquatic animals I showed you earlier on.

So that's really what makes this an incredible discovery. It ' s a dinosaur like no other. And some people told me, "Wow, this is a once-in-a-lifetime(only once in a lifetime) discovery. There is not many things left-to-discover in the world. " Well, I think nothing could is furtherfrom the truth (away from the truth). I think the Sahara ' s still full treasures, and when people tell me there is no places left to explore, I like to quote A famous dinosaur hunter, Roy Chapman Andrews, and he said, "always, there have been an adventure just around the corn Er (at the corner; coming soon)--and the world is still full of corners. " That is true many decades ago when Roy Chapman Andrews wrote these lines. And it is still true today.

Thank

# Comments I like

What's the evolutionary advantage of the sail on the Spinosaurus ' back?

Things, including animals, is not ' who. ' Only people is "who." Everything else is ' that. '. What happened to schools and teachers?

Ted_topic7:how we unearthed the Spinosaurus