Nanotyrant is Real: New Tyrannosaur species Confirmed

For forty years, paleontologists have fiercely debated the classification of rare fossil specimens. Some believed they were young Tyrannosaurus rex. Others argued for a new species, Nanotyrannus lanceensis. Now, a new analysis of a remarkably preserved fossil appears to have settled the argument.

The conclusion? It is a new species, according to a recent paper in the journal Nature. Researchers also reclassified another specimen as a second, distinct species from N. lanceensis. Essentially, Nanotyrant is a valid group containing two species.

“This fossil doesn’t just settle the debate,” said Lindsay Zanno, a paleontologist at North Carolina State University and head of paleontology at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. “It flips decades of T. rex research on its head.” paleontologists have used these fossils to understand T. rex growth and behavior. These new findings suggest multiple tyrannosaur species existed, and our understanding of these apex predators needs revision.