SCIENCE LAB SCANARS : MONGOLIAN MARVEL

'' Shockingly beautiful '' fossil changes narrative on dome-headed dinosaur Tsogtbaatar Chinzorig, a paleontologist at North Carolina State University didn't have to travel far on the day he made what may be the most important fossil discovery of his career.

As he stepped out of his tent in the Gobi Desert in Mongolia to start his day of fossil hunting, he noticed something small and spherical protruding from a nearby hillside.

Upon closer inspection, Dr. Chinzorig quickly realized this wasn't just any round rock; it was the dome shaped skull of a pachycephalosaur, a dinosaur famous for its presumed proclivity for head-butting.

Dr. Chinzorig had stumbled upon what would turn out to be the oldest and most complete pachycephalosaur fossil ever found. The specimen was described in the journal Nature.

The researchers say it is 168 to 115 million years old, at least 14 million years older than the time scientists had thought these dinosaurs first evolved their helmet-like heads.

The fossil also had intact arms and hands, as well as stomach full of stones. The study's authors named the species Zavacephale rinpoche. It means '' root '' and '' jewel '' in Tibetan.

'' For those of us who study the dome-headed dinosaurs, Zavacephale is the specimen we have all been waiting for,'' said David Evans, a paleontologist who was not involved in the study.

'' This is a very exciting fossil that helps illuminate the early evolutionary history of this famous, yet poorly understood, group of dinosaurs.''

This Evolutionary Publishing continues to Part [2].

The World Students Society thanks Annie Roth.