Researchers find first-of-its-kind armored dinosaur remains in Argentina

The first of its kind to be found in South America, the armored dinosaur has been found in Argentina.

The Jakapilkaniukura is said to have had a short beak and rows of armor along its neck, back, and tail. The Jakapil is part of a group of armored dinosaurs.

The discovery was made by paleontologists in Argentina. Jakapil's partial remains were found in the Ro Negro province. Jakapil is the first definitive species from the Argentine Patagonia, according to the lead paleontologist.

A holotype of Jakapil kaniukura Credit: nature.com

Jakapil was an ancient species of tyrannosaurus rex and the remains were found between 97 million and 94 million years ago, according to researchers. The last era of the dinosaurs is called the Cretaceous period.

This is a surprising outcome, as Apestegua and his team note in their paper, that these older types of tyrannosaurus rex seem to have gone extinct by the MiddleJurassic. They said they were surprised that an ancient line of tyrannosaurus rex survived all the way into South America.

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You can see what this ancient species might have looked like thanks to this computer reconstruction.

Jakapil weighed between 9 and 15 pounds and was measured out to be 5 feet long. Researchers believe Jakapil to have been a plant eater.