Episode 451: A dinosaur with bladelike spikes and natural plywood armor. A new ankylosaur, a new ornithopod, and Dr. Will Tattersdill joins us to discuss dinosaurs in Victorian-era pop culture

News:

• A new ankylosaur from the Isle of Wight, Vectipelta, had armor similar to 1/2 inch thick plywood in its skin and bladelike spikes on its sides source
• Scientists named a new ornithopod dinosaur, Calvarius rapidus source
• A new dinosaur short, “We Hunt Giants” co-produced by Andreas Feix and Titus Pair source

Interview:

Will Tattersdill, a Senior Lecturer in Literature and Contemporary Fantasy Cultures at the University of Glasgow. He is an expert in late-Victorian science fiction and explores how the connections between dinosaur science and science fiction.

Sponsors:

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The dinosaur of the day: Ilokelesia

• Abelisaurid theropod that lived in the Late Cretaceous in what is now Neuquén Province, Argentina (Huincul Formation)
• Kind of looked like Carnotaurus, but without the horns
• Walked on two legs, had a long tail, long legs, and very short arms
• Considered to be medium-sized
• Have had several size estimates: 13 ft (4 m) long and 440 lb (200 kg); 17 ft (5.3 m) long; and 19 ft (5.8 m) long weighing 1850 lb (840 kg)
• Described in 1998 by Rodolfo Coria and Leonardo Salgado
• Fragments of the skull and skeleton found in 1991
• Holotype included part of the skull, five articulated tail vertebrae, a couple neck and back vertebrae, cervical ribs, several toe bones
• Unique features in the skull bones, and in the vertebrae (in the hollow depressions in the bones)
• Type species is Ilokelesia aguadagrandensis
• Genus name means “flesh lizard” or a “flesh eating reptile”
• Species name refers to where the fossils were found, in Aguada Grande
• Lived in an arid environment
• Other dinosaurs that lived around the same time and place include carcharodontosaurs such as Mapusaurus and Meraxes, titanosaurs including Argentinosaurus and Chucarosaurus, and hadrosaurs

Fun Fact:

Carnotaurus had the proportionally shortest hands of any large carnivorous dinosaur.

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