Australian Dinosaur Has 'Parrot's Beak' And 'Turtle's Ear'

Kunbarrasaurus is one of Australia's latest dinosaurs, which has a parrot-like beak, bones beneath its skin and an inner ear almost identical to a turtle's. The Kunbarrasaurus' skeleton is about the size of a sheep and it was discovered back in 1989. Years later, a study led by researchers at the University of Queensland found that the dinosaur belongs to a distinctly different species than previously thought.

The Kunbarrasaurus skeleton is one of the most intact and well-preserved ankylosaur dinosaur fossils that has been found in Australia, according to the researchers.

"Ankylosaurs were a group of four-legged, herbivorous dinosaurs, closely related to stegosaurs," Lucy Leahey, co-author of the study, said in a news release. "Like crocodiles, they had bones in their skin and are commonly referred to as 'armored' dinosaurs."

The researchers discovered that the fossil is different from other types of ankylosaurs, thus a new name did the honors. The researchers used CT scanning and 3-D reconstruction of the dinosaur's inner ear, brain and nasal cavities to carry out their investigation.

"The CT reconstruction revealed that Kunbarrasaurus had a more complicated airway than other dinosaurs, but less so than ankylosaurs from the Northern Hemisphere," said Lawrence Witmer, co-author of the study. "The inner ear is proportionately enormous and unlike anything we have seen before in a dinosaur. It looks more like the inner ear of a Tuatara or a turtle."

The researchers claimed that the Kunbarrasaurus specimen should be classified as a new dinosaur.

"Our work has also revealed that Kunbarrasaurus is more primitive than the majority of other well-known ankylosaurs from North America and Asia," said Dr. Steve Salisbury, co-author of the study.

The "Kunbarrasaurus ieversi" fossil is on display at the Queensland Museum.

The findings of this study were published in the journal PeerJ.

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