Brazilian paleontologists last week proudly put on display a skeleton of a crocodile that roamed the earth in the time of the dinosaurs 90 million years ago.
The remains of the Baurusuchus salgadoensis were well preserved and included a complete head, said Pedro Henrique Nobre from the University of Rio department of geology, where the presentation was held.
"Finding a fossil is rare, but finding a collection of fossils [from the same animal] is even more rare and finding an intact head is extraordinary," Nobre said.
PHOTO: AP
The Baurusuchus was 3.5m long, and scientists estimate it weighed 400kg.
The paleontologists also presented a life-size reconstruction of what they believe the creature looked like.
The Baurusuchus remains were found 15 years ago in the western region of the state of Sao Paulo. It is the first time they have gone on display after years of restoration.
Unlike modern-day crocodiles, the Baurusuchus lived on land in a dry area. The location of the creature's nasal pasages indicated that it could not spend much time underwater, Nobre said.
The reptile had longer and more powerful rear legs than modern crocodiles, and the animal's teeth indicte that it was an active predator, he added.
The Baurusuchus belongs to the same family of ancient reptiles whose remains have been found in Argentina, southern Africa and the region between India and Pakistan. The scientists said their discovery suggests that an ancient land bridge linked South America to Indo-Pakistan.
The creature lived in the Cretaceous period, which lasted from 144 to 65 million years ago. It was the last period during which dinosaurs lived.
The unexpected collapse of the recall campaigns is being viewed through many lenses, most of them skewed and self-absorbed. The international media unsurprisingly focuses on what they perceive as the message that Taiwanese voters were sending in the failure of the mass recall, especially to China, the US and to friendly Western nations. This made some sense prior to early last month. One of the main arguments used by recall campaigners for recalling Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers was that they were too pro-China, and by extension not to be trusted with defending the nation. Also by extension, that argument could be
Aug. 4 to Aug. 10 When Coca-Cola finally pushed its way into Taiwan’s market in 1968, it allegedly vowed to wipe out its major domestic rival Hey Song within five years. But Hey Song, which began as a manual operation in a family cow shed in 1925, had proven its resilience, surviving numerous setbacks — including the loss of autonomy and nearly all its assets due to the Japanese colonial government’s wartime economic policy. By the 1960s, Hey Song had risen to the top of Taiwan’s beverage industry. This success was driven not only by president Chang Wen-chi’s
Last week, on the heels of the recall election that turned out so badly for Taiwan, came the news that US President Donald Trump had blocked the transit of President William Lai (賴清德) through the US on his way to Latin America. A few days later the international media reported that in June a scheduled visit by Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) for high level meetings was canceled by the US after China’s President Xi Jinping (習近平) asked Trump to curb US engagement with Taiwan during a June phone call. The cancellation of Lai’s transit was a gaudy
The centuries-old fiery Chinese spirit baijiu (白酒), long associated with business dinners, is being reshaped to appeal to younger generations as its makers adapt to changing times. Mostly distilled from sorghum, the clear but pungent liquor contains as much as 60 percent alcohol. It’s the usual choice for toasts of gan bei (乾杯), the Chinese expression for bottoms up, and raucous drinking games. “If you like to drink spirits and you’ve never had baijiu, it’s kind of like eating noodles but you’ve never had spaghetti,” said Jim Boyce, a Canadian writer and wine expert who founded World Baijiu Day a decade
RSS