New York museum unveils newest fossil find

The Manila Times

New York museum unveils newest fossil find   The American Museum of Natural History reveals the identity of its latest resident on Dec. 5, 2024 - 'Apex,' one of the most complete specimens of the spiny-backed dinosaur known as a stegosaurus ever discovered. To excited gasps from an audience of school children, the museum pulled back a beige curtain to reveal the 11-foot (3.4-m) tall, 20-foot (6-m) long skeleton. The Stegosaurus was a herbivorous dinosaur that walked on four legs and lived around 150 million years ago, during the Jurassic period. The fossil was found in Colorado and fetched a record $44.6 million at a Sotheby's auction in July. The buyer has loaned it out to the New York museum, popular with tourists and school children.  REUTERS VIDEO  Subscribe to The Manila Times Channel - https://tmt.ph/YTSubscribe    Visit our website at https://www.manilatimes.net    Follow us:  Facebook - https://tmt.ph/facebook  Instagram - https://tmt.ph/instagram  Twitter - https://tmt.ph/twitter  DailyMotion - https://tmt.ph/dailymotion    Subscribe to our Digital Edition - https://tmt.ph/digital    Check out our Podcasts:  Spotify - https://tmt.ph/spotify  Apple Podcasts - https://tmt.ph/applepodcasts  Amazon Music - https://tmt.ph/amazonmusic  Deezer: https://tmt.ph/deezer  Tune In: https://tmt.ph/tunein   #TheManilaTimes #tmtnews #apex  #stegosaurus  #fossil

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00:00Five, four, three, two, one.

00:10We are thrilled to unveil the magnificent Stegosaurus specimen, April.

00:30We are thrilled to unveil the magnificent Stegosaurus specimen, April.

01:01The biggest, probably one of the biggest fossils, like the biggest dinosaur fossils I've ever seen.

01:09It's really fascinating and it's really amazing that 80% of that is real fossils and it's like the fake ones, you can't even actually tell that they're fake.

01:19I really like it because it's like really cool and it's really big and it's amazing that it spent 10,000 years in the ground waiting for somebody to scoop it up.

01:49I was, I just thought like, oh my gosh, like this is crazy.

02:19What did you think of it?

02:20Awesome.

02:49People are really excited about this fossil because Stegosaurus is an iconic dinosaur.

02:58It was discovered 150 years ago and it's really captured people's imaginations because of its distinctive appearance.

03:05It's also central to early discoveries of dinosaurs, so to the history of paleontology.

03:10And honestly, everyone has their own favourite dinosaur, but Stegosaurus is up there in the top five.

03:15So it's hard not to get excited about a really complete large individual of this animal.

03:20Stegosaurus is a big herbivorous dinosaur that walks on all fours.

03:45So it's a quadruped.

03:47The head is small.

03:49It had to eat a lot.

03:50And its strategy for eating food was to get as much food into the gut as possible.

03:54So it didn't chew its food very much.

03:57So it's different to mammals like us or like an elephant.

04:01Stegosaurus wasn't like, although it was a herbivore, Stegosaurus wasn't like a cow or a sheep.

04:06It's a herbivore that could look after itself.

04:08It has these wicked spikes on its tail.

04:11It has plates along its back.

04:14They're most likely not for defence, but instead for display, like the brightly coloured feathers of some birds or the frills and crests of some lizards.

04:23So, for example, to attract mates or to establish dominance with other individuals of Stegosaurus.

04:29So it's a big herbivore the size of a smallish elephant that could really look after itself and had a personality.

04:43So we're going to take a sample of one of the bones of Stegosaurus because as the animal grows, its bone grows.

04:55And that leaves evidence preserved in the bone, similar to tree rings, that tell us about years of growth in the animal.

05:02And this Stegosaurus, because it's a large old individual, it's going to tell us about the last part of the life history of Stegosaurus.

05:09And if we put that information together with evidence from other fossil specimens of the same species, so smaller individuals,

05:16we're going to get some understanding of how long Stegosaurus lived, how long it was growing for,

05:20how quickly it grew compared to living reptiles or living mammals and birds.

05:25And that's really an important fundamental piece of the biology of this dinosaur.

05:39So today at the American Museum of Natural History, we unveiled a new exhibition, installation of Apex,

05:50one of the most complete Stegosaurus specimens ever found.

05:57And it will be on display here in the Gilder Center atrium.

06:01This was the dinosaur that was purchased by Ken Griffin from Sotheby's this summer.

06:15And at the time, Mr. Griffin said he was committed to having this on display at a museum and also available for scientific research.

06:25And so we are we are proud that AMNH is a place that was chosen both to share this specimen with the world,

06:32but also to make sure that we can share it with the scientific community and engage in scientific research on this.

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