Fleshy comb is first found on a dinosaur
Fossil head has both duck bill and soft-tissue crest
By Susan Milius
A well-known duck-billed face needs to be reimagined with a dinosaur version of a chicken comb on top.
A recently unearthed skull fossil of the duck-billed dinosaur Edmontosaurus regalis has remains of a fleshy head dome, says paleontologist Phil Bell of the University of New England in Armidale, Australia. It’s the first boneless crest found on any dinosaur, Bell and his colleagues report December 12 in Current Biology.
Paleontologists know of plenty of extravagant dinosaur headgear, including on other duck-billed species, but all are bony structures. Skin and soft tissue rot so fast that only extraordinary conditions preserve them.