Dinosaurs Once Crossed Oceans: First Duckbill Dinosaur Fossil Discovered in Africa

The first fossils of a duckbilled dinosaur have been discovered in Africa, suggesting dinosaurs crossed hundreds of kilometers of open water to get there.

The study, published in Cretaceous Research, reports the new dinosaur, Ajnabia odysseus, from rocks in Morocco dating to the end of the Cretaceous, 66 million years ago. Ajnabia was a member of the duckbill dinosaurs, diverse plant-eating dinosaurs that grew up to 15 meters long. But the new dinosaur was tiny compared to its kin- at just 3 meters long, it was as big as a pony.

Duckbills evolved in North America and eventually spread to South America, Asia, and Europe. Because Africa was an island continent in the Late Cretaceous, isolated by deep seaways, it seemed impossible for duckbills to get there.

The discovery of the new fossil in a mine a few hours from Casablanca was “about the last thing in the world you would expect,” said Dr. Nicholas Longrich, of the Milner Centre for Evolution at the University of Bath, who led the study. Dr. Longrich said: “It was completely out of place, like finding a kangaroo in Scotland. Africa was completely isolated by water — so how did they get there?”

Study of Ajnabia ‘s distinctive teeth and jawbones show it belonged to Lambeosaurinae, a subfamily of duckbills with elaborate bony head crests. Lambeosaurs evolved in North America before spreading to Asia and Europe, but have never been found in Africa before.

Reconstructing duckbill evolution, they found the lambeosaurs evolved in North America, then spread over a land bridge to Asia. From there, they colonized Europe, and finally Africa.

Because Africa was isolated by deep oceans at the time, duckbills must have crossed hundreds of kilometers of open water- rafting on debris, floating, or swimming — to colonize the continent. Duckbills were probably powerful swimmers — they had large tails and powerful legs, and are often found in river deposits and marine rocks, so they may have simply swum the distance.

“Sherlock Holmes said, once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth,” said Longrich. “It was impossible to walk to Africa. These dinosaurs evolved long after continental drift split the continents, and we have no evidence of land bridges. The geology tells us Africa was isolated by oceans. If so, the only way to get there is by water.”

In reference to this feat, the dinosaur is named “ Ajnabia odysseus. “ Ajnabi being Arabic for “foreigner,” and Odysseus referring to the Greek seafarer.

Ocean crossings are rare, improbable events, but have been observed in historic times. In one case, green iguanas traveled between Caribbean islands during a hurricane borne on debris. In another, a tortoise from the Seychelles floated hundreds of kilometers across the Indian Ocean to wash up in Africa.

“Over millions of years,” said Longrich, “Once-in-a-century events are likely to happen many times. Ocean crossings are needed to explain how lemurs and hippos got to Madagascar, or how monkeys and rodents crossed from Africa to South America.”

But the fact that duckbills and other dinosaur groups spread between continents, even with high sea levels, suggests dinosaurs traveled across oceans as well. “As far as I know, we’re the first to suggest ocean crossings for dinosaurs,” said Longrich.

The international team of scientists was led by the University of Bath with researchers from the University of the Basque Country UVP/EHU (Spain), George Washington University (USA) and the Natural History Museum of Sorbonne University (France) / Universite Cadi Ayyad (Morocco).

Dr. Nour-Eddine Jalil, from the Natural History Museum of Sorbonne University (France) said: “The succession of improbable events (crossing an ocean by a dinosaur, fossilization of a terrestrial animal in a marine environment) highlights the rarity of our find and therefore its importance.

“ Ajnabia shows us that hadrosaurs have set foot on African land, telling us that ocean barriers are not always an insurmountable obstacle.”

Activity of the industrial catalyst TS-1 relies on titanium pairs/Important discovery for catalyst development.

‘Titanium silicalite-1’ (TS-1) is not a new catalyst: It has been almost 40 years since its development and the discovery of its ability to convert propylene into propylene oxide, an important basic chemical in the chemical industry. Now, by combining various methods, a team of scientists from ETH Zurich, the University of Cologne, the Fritz Haber Institute and BASF has unveiled the surprising mechanism of action of this catalyst. From Cologne, the working group of Professor Dr. Albrecht Berkessel at the Department of Chemistry was involved. These findings will help catalyst research take an important step forward.

Propylene oxide is used in industry to make products such as polyurethanes, antifreeze additives and hydraulic fluids. More than 11 million metric tons of propylene oxide are produced annually in the chemical industry worldwide, of which 1 million metric tons are already produced by the oxidation of propylene with hydrogen peroxide. This chemical reaction is catalyzed by TS-1, a microporous, crystalline material made up of silicon and oxygen and containing small amounts of titanium. The catalyst has been used successfully for 40 years and experts assumed that the active center in TS-1 contains individual, isolated titanium atoms that ensure the special reactivity of the catalyst.

A team of researchers from the ETH Zurich, the University of Cologne, the Fritz Haber Institute and BASF questioned this assumption. “In recent years, doubts have arisen as to whether the assumption about the mechanism of action is correct, as it relies primarily on analogies with comparable catalysts and less on experimental evidence. But if you try to optimize a catalyst on the basis of a wrong assumption, it is very difficult and can lead you in the completely wrong direction. It was therefore important to examine this assumption more closely,” explains BASF scientist Dr. Henrique Teles, one of the co-authors of the scientific publication, the starting point for the collaboration.

In a study now published in Nature, the team was able, by using solid-state NMR studies and computer modeling, to show that two neighboring titanium atoms are necessary to explain the particular catalytic activity. This in turn led the research team to conclude that the titanium atoms are not isolated but rather the catalytically active center consists of a titanium pair. “None of the methods we used in the study are fundamentally new, but none of the research groups involved in the study could have carried out the investigation on their own,” emphasizes Prof. Christophe Copéret from ETH Zurich, the corresponding author of the publication. “Only the combination of different fields of expertise and various techniques made it possible to more closely examine the active center of the catalyst.”

“We have worked for many years to elucidate the reaction mechanism of a homogeneous titanium catalyst and found that — contrary to the assumptions in the literature — the hydrogen peroxide is activated by a titanium pair. It was really a special moment when we saw in the current study that the findings from homogeneous catalysis also apply to heterogeneous catalysis,” said co-author Prof. Albrecht Berkessel from the University of Cologne. And Dr. Thomas Lunkenbein, co-author from the Fritz Haber Institute in Berlin, adds: “We are very pleased that we were able to make a contribution to this study. With our analytics, we were able to substantiate the conclusions. The knowledge of a diatomic active center is of fundamental importance and opens up new possibilities in catalyst research.”

The team is convinced that the findings of this study will not only help to improve existing catalysts, but also to develop new homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysts.

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