New Species Of Armored Dinosaur Hints At Ancient Migration

Akainacephalus johnsoni sported prominent spikes along its skull and snout. (Credit: Andrey Atuchin/Natural History Museum of Utah) Scientists revealed a new species of armored dinosaur at the Natural History Museum of Utah on Wednesday. The animal, a species of ankylosaur, lived in a wet, tropical environment in what’s now Southern Utah roughly 75 million years ago. The herbivore sported spikes across its head and an intimidating tail club for fending off large predators like the tyrannosaurs that also roamed the landscape. Scientists dubbed it Akainacephalus johnsoni. “Literally translated, it means spikey head,” says Jelle Wiersma, lead author of a study on the dinosaur published in the open-access journal PeerJ. Its age makes it the oldest ankylosaur known from North America. And, based on its appearance, researchers say it was more closely related to Asian ankylosaurs than many known from the United States. That offers some clues the animals’ evolutionary past. “We know that the ankylosaurid dinosaurs migrated over from Asia into North America,” Wiersma says. But the details were foggy.