The Big Dinosaur Podcast

Episode 225 is all about Atlascopcosaurus, an Early Cretaceous iguanodont from southern Australia.

We also interview Michael D’Emic, Assistant Professor of Biology at Adelphi University. He has studied dinosaur body size evolution, bone tissues, and teeth. We discuss the crazy number of teeth that Majungasaurus grew, Allosaurus growth variation, why some Titanosaurs had osteoderms, and a lot more. Follow him on Twitter @astrophocaudia

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In this episode, we discuss:

News:

• A new ornithopod, Galleonosaurus dorisae, was found in Southern Victoria, Australia source
• A group of 29 young ornithopods were named Convolosaurus marri in Texas source
• Jurassic National Monument in Utah was confirmed as part of a new public lands bill source
• India is planning on building their own version of the Smithsonian Museum, called the Indian Museum of Earth source
• Calgary Zoo in Canada is giving its Dinny the Dinosaur statue a $200,000 makeover source
• An animatronic dinosaur ride is coming to the Bronx Zoo in April source
• In Berkeley New Jersey, there will soon be a new dinosaur outside Sand Castle Diner, to keep Bud the Bayville dinosaur company source
• Publication Studio Games created a fun text based, choose your own adventure game, called A Dinosaur Named David Swims in a Japanese pool source
• You can now buy a toy model version of the Google Chrome T. rex source

The dinosaur of the day: Atlascopcosaurus

• Basal iguanodont that lived in the Early Cretaceous in what is now Australia (Eumeralla Formation)
• Type species is Atlascopcosaurus loadsi
• Name means “Atlas Copco lizard”
• Named after the Atlas Copco Company, who provided the equipment for the dig in 1984
• Species name is in honor of William Loads, the state manager for Atlas Coco, who helped with the dig
• Holotype includes part of the upper jaw, partial maxilla
• Referred specimens had teeth, maxilla, and dentaries
• Estimates based on closely related species
• Estimated to be 6.5 to 10 ft (2 to 3 m) long and weighed about 275 lb (125 kg)
• First fossil found in 1979 (upper jaw found by Francois Bussat, part of a group of researchers in the Otway Coast)
• Found in 1984
• First dinosaur maxilla found in Victoria, Australia
• Described in 1988 and 1989 by Tom Rich and Patricia Vickers-Rich
• Found in the same formation as Leaellynasaura (named by the same people, also in 1989, covered in episode 71)
• Originally referred to Hypsilophodontidae, but in 2004 Norman and others suggested it was closely related to Gasparinisaura (an ornithopod from South America), and in 2010 Agnolin and others suggested it had a lot in common with Gasparinisaura and Anabisetia (iguanodont from South America) though Agnolin also considered Atlascopcosaurus to be a nomen dubium, though not everyone agrees

Fun Fact: Crows can problem solve in even more advanced ways than we knew about previously