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Fossils

A restoration of the island hadrosauroid Tethyshadros by Nobu Tamura

The “Duck-billed” Dinosaur That Wasn’t

Instead of a long, low duck bill, the beak of Tethyshadros was shaped like a snowplow and serrated. Why it had such a strange beak is a mystery

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How an Ankylosaur Went Out to Sea

How did a heavily armored dinosaur wind up at the bottom of Alberta’s Cretaceous sea?

A parent Massospondylus attends to its hatchlings

Paleontologists Uncover Oldest Known Dinosaur Nest Site

The “lay ‘em and leave ‘em” strategy might not have been the ancestral state for these dinosaurs

The reconstructed shoulder and arm of Majungasaurus

Fearsome Dinosaur Had Ridiculously Short Arms

The forelimbs of this animal look like an evolutionary joke

A dragon statue in Ljubljana, Slovenia

Ask Smithsonian 2017

Where Did Dragons Come From?

In honor of the Year of the Dragon, we take a look at some potential inspirations for the dragon myth

A clutch of sauropod eggs at the geothermal nesting site in Argentina. Eggs are outlined by black dashes.

Some Dinosaurs Used Natural Heat for Their Nests

The sauropod site may have resembled Yellowstone National Park, with geysers, hot springs and mud pots

A specimen of the non-avian dinosaur Sinosauropteryx, showing the ruff of simple protofeathers along the back and tail.

Dinosaurs of a Feather

Some researchers insist that birds are not dinosaurs, but do they have any evidence?

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The Greatest Dinosaur Hits of 2011

This was a big year for dinosaur discoveries and debates. Here are a few highlights

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How to Turn a Dinosaur Into a Bird

Two classic bits of animation beautifully visualized the evolution of birds from dinosaurs

An early 19th century representation of Megalosaurus at the Crystal Palace gardens. Thomas Henry Huxley's work gave dinosaurs a much more bird-like look.

Huxley’s Apocryphal Dinosaur Dinner

Fossil lore says 19th century naturalist T.H. Huxley realized that birds were dinosaurs when he carved into a Christmas turkey, but what really happened?

A reconstruction of Patagonykus. The newly-described Bonapartenykus was a close relative of this dinosaur.

Eggs and Enigmatic Dinosaurs

Paleontologists have found the bones of a new dinosaur with eggs nearby, but how do we know whether the bones and eggs go together?

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Hitchcock’s Primeval Birds

Paleontologist Edward Hitchcock was one of the first dinosaur track experts, but why did he insist that birds left the footprints?

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Nedoceratops: To Be, or Not to Be?

Should Nedoceratops and Torosaurus be sunk into Triceratops? The debate continues, and it’s not just a bit of paleontological arcana

Tail vertebrae from a previously known Alamosaurus specimen (A), compared with a newly-discovered Alamosaurus tail vertebra (B) and a tail vertebra from the large titanosaur Futalognkosaurus (C).

Alamosaurus Gets Pumped Up

New fossils give a body size boost to what may have been North America’s largest dinosaur, Alamosaurus

A life restoration of Spinops sternbergorum

Spinops: The Long-Lost Dinosaur

Spinops was one funky looking dinosaur, and its discovery emphasizes the role of museum collections. Who knows what else is waiting to be rediscovered?

Bones from the foot of a hadrosaur attributed to Edmontosaurus annectens

A Detailed Guide to a Hadrosaur’s Foot

This is not super-sexy research, but some of the biggest gaps in our understanding about dinosaurs involve relatively simple things

A reconstructed skeleton of Rapetosaurus on display at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago.

Inside Sauropod Armor

A hollow, thin-walled bone is not exactly the sort of structure that is going to protect a sauropod from attack—so what was its purpose?

A reconstructed model of a young Tyrannosaurus at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. Were these little tyrants covered in feathers?

Was Tyrannosaurus a Big Turkey?

A Microraptor catches a prehistoric bird, based on bird bones found within one Microraptor specimen.

Non-Avian Dinosaur Eats Avian Dinosaur

Paleontologists have found the bones of a bird inside a feathered dinosaur. What can this discovery tell us about how Microraptor lived?

The track of an Early Jurassic theropod dinosaur at St. George, Utah's Dinosaur Discovery Site. This track is of the same general type and close of the age of the tracks recently found near Las Vegas.

Paleontologists Track Dinosaurs Near Las Vegas

Very few skeletons have been found from this period, and much of what we know about the dinosaurs of the Early Jurassic Southwest comes from tracksites

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