![](https://i0.wp.com/images.newscientist.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/19143601/SEI_209419779.jpg?resize=749%2C499&ssl=1)
The dinosaur's fossils were discovered on private land near the US-Canada border in Montana in 2019. They were purchased by the Danish Museum of Evolution, where they are now on display.
The creature is thought to have lived around 78 million years ago, was around 6.7 metres long and weighed around five tonnes.
Lociceratops rangiformis, As its name suggests, it had two long horns at the front of its head and three main horns on its frill at the back of its head. The largest frill horns, on either side of its skull, were flat, wide, and curved into a scimitar shape.
It was probably used for display purposes rather than for defense. Joseph Sertich At Colorado State University, the length of the outer curve was measured to be more than 60 centimeters. “In terms of absolute volume and length, Lociceratops “It had the biggest frill horns I've ever seen,” Sertich said.
It lived about 12 million years before its best-known relative. TriceratopsAt the time, its habitat, in what is now western North America, was an island continent named Laramidia.
Several other ceratopsian dinosaurs have been found in the same collection, “so this is the first time we've found five ceratopsians from the same place and time,” Sertich says.
Mark Lowen Researchers from the University of Utah named the fossil after the Norse god Loki, as its permanent home is now in Denmark. Rangiformisrefers to the similarity between the asymmetric central frill horns of dinosaurs and the asymmetric front rami, or branches, of reindeer antlers.
“Many modern deer have asymmetric antlers,” says Loewen. “We know that asymmetry is not uncommon in horned dinosaurs, but Lociceratops. “
Erich Fitzgerald Researchers from Museum Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, say the discovery reveals an extraordinary biodiversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs that evolved during the Late Cretaceous period in western North America.
“This study highlights the differences between the horned dinosaur fauna from 80 to 70 million years ago and that of the End Cretaceous Period, 66 to 68 million years ago. Triceratops “They dominated a low-diversity group of horned megafaunas,” Fitzgerald said.
topic:
Source: www.newscientist.com