1 00:00:01,920 --> 00:00:06,440 Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey 2 00:00:06,519 --> 00:00:11,960 Speaker 1: brain Stuff, Lauren Bogelbaum. Here mesozoic cow sounds like a 3 00:00:12,080 --> 00:00:15,880 Speaker 1: joke cribbed from Gary Lawson's The Far Side, But it's not. 4 00:00:16,640 --> 00:00:20,360 Speaker 1: That nickname was given to the African dinosaur Nigrosaurus to 5 00:00:20,480 --> 00:00:24,120 Speaker 1: ka back when some new discoveries about its appearance were 6 00:00:24,120 --> 00:00:28,200 Speaker 1: made public in two thousand seven. Speaking to NPR at 7 00:00:28,200 --> 00:00:33,080 Speaker 1: the time, paleontologist Pulse Orino called Nigrosaurus the weirdest dinosaur 8 00:00:33,159 --> 00:00:36,280 Speaker 1: I've ever seen. He then compared its face to a 9 00:00:36,360 --> 00:00:42,040 Speaker 1: vacuum cleaner and unorthodox herb. Before this red pile grazed 10 00:00:42,080 --> 00:00:44,640 Speaker 1: and what's now the Sahara Desert some a hundred ten 11 00:00:44,720 --> 00:00:48,720 Speaker 1: million years ago. It gathered food with a big broad mouth. 12 00:00:49,240 --> 00:00:51,840 Speaker 1: The creatures snout was wider than the back of its head, 13 00:00:52,760 --> 00:00:57,640 Speaker 1: and Nitrosaurus had teeth to spare hundreds. In fact, a 14 00:00:57,760 --> 00:01:00,880 Speaker 1: Nitrosaurus was a little over twenty nine feet or around 15 00:01:00,960 --> 00:01:05,040 Speaker 1: nine meters long by the most liberal estimates, It weighed 16 00:01:05,120 --> 00:01:07,959 Speaker 1: roughly four and a half tons or four metric tons, 17 00:01:08,480 --> 00:01:11,760 Speaker 1: and so overall the dinosaur was about the size of 18 00:01:11,760 --> 00:01:17,039 Speaker 1: a modern African elephant. There's just one caveat you see. 19 00:01:17,200 --> 00:01:21,520 Speaker 1: Nitrosaurus was soro pod, one of the major dinosaurian groups. 20 00:01:21,800 --> 00:01:25,120 Speaker 1: The plant eating small headed sauropods hung around for about 21 00:01:25,120 --> 00:01:28,400 Speaker 1: a hundred and forty million years. Their ranks included the 22 00:01:28,520 --> 00:01:32,560 Speaker 1: largest animals to ever walk the earth. Experts say the 23 00:01:32,560 --> 00:01:35,040 Speaker 1: biggest species may have been over a hundred and ten 24 00:01:35,080 --> 00:01:38,800 Speaker 1: feet that's thirty three meters long, and meanwhile, forty eight 25 00:01:38,920 --> 00:01:42,160 Speaker 1: five foot or twelve to sixteen meter sauropods are common 26 00:01:42,200 --> 00:01:46,760 Speaker 1: throughout some parts of the fossil record. In comparison, Nitrosaurus 27 00:01:46,840 --> 00:01:49,840 Speaker 1: was on the small side, but what caught everyone's attention 28 00:01:50,080 --> 00:01:55,320 Speaker 1: was the dinosaurs. Mug Sereno's vacuum cleaner comparison is right 29 00:01:55,360 --> 00:01:59,400 Speaker 1: on the money. Viewed from above, Nitrosaurus's wide muzzle looks 30 00:01:59,480 --> 00:02:03,400 Speaker 1: like the the end of one of these household appliances. 31 00:02:03,400 --> 00:02:06,360 Speaker 1: But those jaws held something never before seen in a 32 00:02:06,440 --> 00:02:12,240 Speaker 1: sore pod. Dinosaur tooth or dental batteries. We're not talking 33 00:02:12,240 --> 00:02:15,040 Speaker 1: about double a duras l s here. Dental batteries were 34 00:02:15,040 --> 00:02:19,040 Speaker 1: efficient food processing tools used by many plant eating dinos. 35 00:02:19,280 --> 00:02:23,919 Speaker 1: They consisted of vertically stacked columns of replaceable teeth. Whenever 36 00:02:24,040 --> 00:02:26,680 Speaker 1: the top tooth wore out in any given column, the 37 00:02:26,720 --> 00:02:29,280 Speaker 1: one right below it would move upwards and take the 38 00:02:29,320 --> 00:02:33,720 Speaker 1: old tooth spot. And those tooth columns were packed right 39 00:02:33,760 --> 00:02:38,120 Speaker 1: alongside each other like canned sardines, so a dinosaur armed 40 00:02:38,120 --> 00:02:42,080 Speaker 1: with dental batteries could comfortably house several hundred teeth old 41 00:02:42,120 --> 00:02:47,320 Speaker 1: and new inside its mouth. In Nitrosaurus's case, the upper 42 00:02:47,400 --> 00:02:52,160 Speaker 1: jaws contained sixty columns of small needle shaped teeth, and 43 00:02:52,360 --> 00:02:55,359 Speaker 1: no fewer than sixty eight were present on the lower jaws. 44 00:02:56,240 --> 00:03:00,000 Speaker 1: Tallied together, the beast had more than five hundred individual teeth. 45 00:03:01,880 --> 00:03:05,200 Speaker 1: Dinosaur hunters are used to finding dental batteries and beaked 46 00:03:05,200 --> 00:03:09,880 Speaker 1: herbivores like the horned triceratops, but they're rare among the sauropods, 47 00:03:11,320 --> 00:03:15,280 Speaker 1: and too. The orientation is just as important as tooth quantity. 48 00:03:15,480 --> 00:03:19,040 Speaker 1: Ask anyone who's ever needed races me included all the 49 00:03:19,080 --> 00:03:22,080 Speaker 1: tooth columns in Nigrosaurus is dental batteries were lined up 50 00:03:22,120 --> 00:03:24,720 Speaker 1: at the very front of its mouth, a position along 51 00:03:24,760 --> 00:03:29,440 Speaker 1: the muzzles gently curved outer edge. So what's the dinosaur 52 00:03:29,480 --> 00:03:33,399 Speaker 1: to do with choppers like these? Nibbling on treetops probably 53 00:03:33,480 --> 00:03:37,760 Speaker 1: wasn't an option. Nigrosaurus wasn't just small bodied for a sauropod. 54 00:03:38,040 --> 00:03:41,040 Speaker 1: It also had a fairly short neck and no The 55 00:03:41,120 --> 00:03:45,040 Speaker 1: evidence suggests Nigrosaurus fed at ground level, sort of like 56 00:03:45,120 --> 00:03:49,800 Speaker 1: a cow. Nigrosaurus was named after the West African country 57 00:03:49,800 --> 00:03:52,640 Speaker 1: where its fossils have been found, the Republic of Niger. 58 00:03:53,320 --> 00:03:56,640 Speaker 1: Back when this animal reamed, forests and braided rivers covered 59 00:03:56,640 --> 00:04:02,200 Speaker 1: the landscape, that wide muzzle was perfect scooping up ferns, horsetails, 60 00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:05,840 Speaker 1: and other low lying plants, and with its bountiful teeth, 61 00:04:05,960 --> 00:04:09,320 Speaker 1: the dinosaur would have had no trouble shearing through this vegetation. 62 00:04:11,120 --> 00:04:13,480 Speaker 1: Eating like that can be rough on your dental health. 63 00:04:14,160 --> 00:04:16,960 Speaker 1: Nigrosaurus must have worn out its tooth crowns at a 64 00:04:17,040 --> 00:04:20,320 Speaker 1: rapid fire pace. Good thing it had a constant supply 65 00:04:20,400 --> 00:04:24,120 Speaker 1: of fresh teeth. According to a study published in the 66 00:04:24,200 --> 00:04:28,919 Speaker 1: journal Plos one, Nigrosaurus likely replaced each new tooth after 67 00:04:29,000 --> 00:04:34,200 Speaker 1: just fourteen days. Because Nitrosaurus ate with its head down, 68 00:04:34,640 --> 00:04:37,919 Speaker 1: experts have wondered about its posture. Sereno and his co 69 00:04:38,000 --> 00:04:40,839 Speaker 1: authors once argued that the herbivore aimed its face and 70 00:04:40,920 --> 00:04:43,880 Speaker 1: neck downwards whether it was feeding or not. As a 71 00:04:43,920 --> 00:04:48,359 Speaker 1: matter of habit. Through a painstaking process, this team was 72 00:04:48,400 --> 00:04:52,479 Speaker 1: able to reconstruct the inside of Nitrosaurus's skull, and that 73 00:04:52,560 --> 00:04:55,680 Speaker 1: gave them a good look at the lateral semicircular canal 74 00:04:56,000 --> 00:04:59,280 Speaker 1: or LSC of the inner ear, which helps animals keep 75 00:04:59,279 --> 00:05:04,360 Speaker 1: their balance. Judging by the l SC orientation in Nigersaurus, 76 00:05:04,760 --> 00:05:08,440 Speaker 1: Sereno and company hypothesized that the animal usually walked around 77 00:05:08,440 --> 00:05:10,600 Speaker 1: with its snamp pointed at the ground at a sixty 78 00:05:10,600 --> 00:05:14,080 Speaker 1: seven degree angle. A picture of moping teenager and you'll 79 00:05:14,120 --> 00:05:18,320 Speaker 1: get the idea. Other researchers have disputed this claim, though 80 00:05:18,880 --> 00:05:22,680 Speaker 1: studies released in two thousand nineteen found that the position 81 00:05:22,720 --> 00:05:25,839 Speaker 1: of the LSC can't reliably tell us what any given 82 00:05:25,920 --> 00:05:30,920 Speaker 1: sauropods normal head posture would have looked like. Nitrosaurus stayed 83 00:05:31,040 --> 00:05:33,839 Speaker 1: under the radar for quite a while. The first known 84 00:05:33,880 --> 00:05:36,800 Speaker 1: fossils belonging to this animal were recovered during the nineteen 85 00:05:36,800 --> 00:05:42,000 Speaker 1: fifties by French paleontologists in the Nigerian Sahara. Unfortunately, most 86 00:05:42,040 --> 00:05:46,520 Speaker 1: of these bones were isolated or fragmentary. Scientists working at 87 00:05:46,520 --> 00:05:49,080 Speaker 1: the time didn't even bother to give the sauropod a name. 88 00:05:50,440 --> 00:05:54,279 Speaker 1: Things got more interesting in that's when a member of 89 00:05:54,320 --> 00:05:58,880 Speaker 1: Sereno's field team noticed some Nigrosaurus skull bones. Over the 90 00:05:58,880 --> 00:06:02,480 Speaker 1: course of two expeditions, enough material was found to reconstruct 91 00:06:02,520 --> 00:06:05,920 Speaker 1: about eight percent of the beast's skeleton. And what a 92 00:06:06,040 --> 00:06:09,640 Speaker 1: skeleton it was. The newfound fossils gave us our first 93 00:06:09,680 --> 00:06:13,400 Speaker 1: look at the dino's complicated dental batteries and vacuum cleaner mouth. 94 00:06:14,120 --> 00:06:17,400 Speaker 1: Sereno named the species Nigrosaurus to k e as an 95 00:06:17,400 --> 00:06:24,240 Speaker 1: homage to paleontologist Philippe to kay In. Scientists probably would 96 00:06:24,240 --> 00:06:27,320 Speaker 1: have found more Nitrosaurus remains a whole lot sooner if 97 00:06:27,320 --> 00:06:30,599 Speaker 1: it hadn't been for the animal's fragile bone structure. A 98 00:06:30,640 --> 00:06:33,760 Speaker 1: to quote a two thousand seven Sereno led study, this 99 00:06:33,839 --> 00:06:39,280 Speaker 1: critter had a featherweight skull, several bones, and Nigrosaurus's head 100 00:06:39,360 --> 00:06:45,320 Speaker 1: were under zero point zero eight inches thick that's two millimeters, 101 00:06:45,360 --> 00:06:49,240 Speaker 1: and the oddities didn't stop there. Like today's birds, many 102 00:06:49,279 --> 00:06:54,520 Speaker 1: prehistoric dinosaurs had hollow bones containing air sacks. Nitrosaurus vertebra 103 00:06:54,680 --> 00:06:57,760 Speaker 1: took this to an extreme. Measured by volume, some of 104 00:06:57,800 --> 00:07:03,919 Speaker 1: its backbones actually contained more air than well bone wayfer 105 00:07:03,960 --> 00:07:07,000 Speaker 1: thin fossils aren't the easiest things to preserve and study. 106 00:07:07,520 --> 00:07:15,800 Speaker 1: Hats off to the researchers doing the work today's episode. 107 00:07:15,800 --> 00:07:18,920 Speaker 1: It's based on the article Nigrosaurus the Mesozoic cow with 108 00:07:18,960 --> 00:07:21,480 Speaker 1: more than five teeth on how stuff works dot Com. 109 00:07:21,480 --> 00:07:24,160 Speaker 1: Written by Mark Mancini. Brain Stuff is a production of 110 00:07:24,160 --> 00:07:26,440 Speaker 1: I Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff works dot Com, 111 00:07:26,520 --> 00:07:29,360 Speaker 1: and it's produced by Tyler Clang. Four more podcasts from 112 00:07:29,360 --> 00:07:32,320 Speaker 1: my heart Radio visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, 113 00:07:32,400 --> 00:07:34,200 Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.