All the dinosaurs have been dead for literally millions of years, but we still manage to find some new ones every once in a while.  Case in point: Nasutoceratops titusi , which was recently made an officially recognized species as described in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society. While this dino is related to the more-famous Triceratops, I think we can all agree that it’s a lot more awesome. After all, you don’t give a creature the name Nasutoceratops — which literally translates to “Big Nose Horn Face” — without it looking pretty dang ridiculous.
The Nasutoceratops’s name comes from its giant horns and a ridiculously enormous nose, which both give it the appearance of a prehistoric lizard cow. While the horns were most likely used to ward off predators, the size of the nose apparently did nothing for this guy’s sense of smell, as the parts of the brain that deal with that sense weren’t enlarged. It’s just a huge honker of a nose. Then again, none of the other dinosaurs were probably ever going to make fun of it for him, because did we mention the giant horns?
Research from the Natural History Museum of Utah and the Denver Museum of Nature & Science puts the Nasutoceratops in Southern Utah (that’s where all our best dinosaurs come from) during the Late Cretaceous period. As a member of the ceratopsian family it was most likely an herbivore, so now I’m of course imagining one trying to grab treestars by goring them with those horns. Yes, I know that it would probably never do that. Shh. Leave me to my dinosaur-laden imagination.
If you’re not like me and you prefer to deal in more specifically scientific speculation, however, the official report can be found on the Proceedings of the Royal Society website.
(via The Guardian, image via Lukas Panzarin)
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