Discovery of the Dinosaur with the Fossilized Heart :: Exploratory Essays Research Papers

Discovery of the Dinosaur with the Fossilized HeartDinosaur fossils are adept of the a few(prenominal) ways in which scientists can study the history of life on earth millions of years ago. Each new discovery is unique in its avouch way and provides valuable education about the past. No two finds are exactly identical therefore, when dinosaur remains are uncovered, the possibility and excitement of new information or even a new species exists. Until the year 2000, no dinosaur has ever been found with a fossilized heart. Scientists at North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of raw(a) Sciences discovered a sixty-six million year old Thescelosaurus with a heart.The Thescelosaurus was a bird-hipped dinosaur or an ornithischian ( Russell 2). This herbivore lived near the end of the Cretaceous period, about one million years before the conclusion of the dinosaur era. Thescelosaurus was about the size of a short-legged pony, gibe to paleontologist Dr. Dal e Russell and was native to North America from Wyoming up to Alberta, Canada.This particular Thescelosaurus was discovered in Harding County, northwestern South Dakota in 1993. It has been estimated to weigh nearly 663 pounds and thirteen feet long. The remains were located in a poorly consolidated channel of sandstone, heart-to-heart in the upper half of the Hell Creek Formation (Fisher 2). Scientists have named this discovery Willo, after the wife of the rancher on whose property it was found. The discovery of Willo is unique because it is the scratch line dinosaur with a fossilized heart. However, this was just the beginning of an extraordinary find. Not only does this specimen have a heart, but computer enhanced images of its chest strongly suggest it is a four-chambered, double-pump heart with a single systemic aorta, more like the heart of a mammal or bird than a reptile, according to Dr. Dale Russell. Russell is a paleontologist at North Carolina State University an d a senior research curator at the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences. This discovery is unusual because all red-brick reptiles, except the crocodile, contain a single ventricle that pumps blood to the lungs and the rest of the body. All modern reptiles have paired systemic aortas developing from the ventricle, which distributes the blood to the body. In contrast, the four chambered heart of modern birds and mammals has two completely separated ventricles and a single systemic aorta, ensuring that only completely oxygenated blood is distributed to the body (Fisher 2).