Science & technology | A diving dinosaur

An amphibious dinosaur from the Cretaceous

It looked like a cormorant but was not a bird

In matters evolutionary, history really does repeat itself. This streamlined skull, dug from the Gobi desert in Mongolia along with parts of a skeleton that show an equally streamlined body, looks like that of a diving seabird such as a cormorant. It actually belongs to a Cretaceous dinosaur dubbed Natovenator polydontus by its discoverers, Lee Sungjin and his colleagues at Seoul National University, in Korea, who report their find in this week’s Communications Biology.

This article appeared in the Science & technology section of the print edition under the headline “An amphibious dinosaur from the Cretaceous”

China’s covid failure

From the December 3rd 2022 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

More from Science & technology

A person's silhouette made up from a mix of multi coloured fragments of plastic

Should you worry about microplastics?

Little is known about the effects on humans—but limiting exposure to them seems prudent

Parasitic wasp - laying egg in hoverfly larvae.

Wasps stole genes from viruses

That probably assisted their evolutionary diversification


The World Health Organisation crest on the wall.

America’s departure from the WHO would harm everyone

Whether it is a negotiating ploy remains to be seen


Genetic engineering could help rid Australia of toxic cane toads

It is better than freezing them to death

High-tech antidotes for snake bites

Genetic engineering and AI are powering the search for antivenins

Can you breathe stress away?

It won’t hurt to try. But scientists are only beginning to understand the links between the breath and the mind