Dinosaur species with giant nose discovered
If you want to discover a new dinosaur, go into the basement of a museum, rather than the field Jeremy Lockwood
ASTAFFORDSHIRE doctor has discovered a new dinosaur – with an incredibly large nose. The beaky beast roamed the Isle of Wight, former Burton-on-Trent GP Jeremy Lockwood has found.
Mr Lockwood spent close to 30 years treating patients at Stapenhill Medical Practice before his retirement in 2015 and now has a new life as a PhD student at the University of Portsmouth, where he is a post-graduate researcher in the School of Environment, Geography and Geosciences.
The new species, named Brighstoneus simmondsi, proves the two most common dinosaurs on the Isle of Wight – known as the “cattle of the Cretaceous” – were not alone.
Jeremy went through the painstaking task of sifting through every single Iguanodon bone discovered on the Isle of Wight in collections at the Natural History Museum and Dinosaur Isle Museum – and he was delighted to discover a huge nasal bone like no other.
He said: “For over 100 years, we’d only seen two types of dinosaur on the Isle of Wight – the plant-eating Iguanodon bernissartensis and Mantellisaurus atherfieldensis. “I was convinced that subtle differences between bones would reveal a new species, so I set out to measure, photograph and study the anatomy of each bone.
“My background is medicine, so I’ve studied anatomy and was always struck by the fact that the bones we find in humans all look exactly the same.
“I’ve seen dinosaur bones that are reportedly from the same species, but I’ve been baffled as to why they would look so different.
“Last year during lockdown – after four years of going through boxes and boxes of bones – I decided to
reconstruct the skull of a specimen which had been in storage since 1978, and, to my astonishment, I noticed the end of its nose was bulbous.
“This discovery made it one of the happiest days of lockdown because it was a sign there really was something different about this particular dinosaur from the Isle of Wight.
“Then I noticed the teeth were different with ridges on both sides, so I shared my findings with Professor Dave Martill from the University of Portsmouth and Dr Susannah Maidment from the Natural History Museum. We were all convinced it was a new species, so I’ve spent months describing it in detail.”
Experts believe the oversized hooter was used as a courtship aid or to scare male rivals.
The new species was excavated in 1978, but was found alongside a theropod (three-toed) dinosaur Neovenator salerii, at the time the most spectacular meat-eating dinosaur found in Britain.
Mr Lockwood said: “If you want to discover a new dinosaur, go into the basement of a museum, rather than the field.
“The finding of such an impressive carnivore all those years ago overshadowed the bones of Brighstoneus simmondsi, so most of it was locked away in storage.”
Brighstoneus is named after the village of Brighstone on the Isle of Wight, which is close to the excavation site and was home to the Reverend William Fox, a celebrated Victorian fossil collector whose discoveries had a major impact on early dinosaur research.
The simmondsi is in honour of Keith Simmonds, an amateur collector, who was involved in finding the specimen.