Graphic by Tom Worman

A University of Portsmouth student has discovered a new type of dinosaur. Mike Taylor, a PhD student in the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences in one of the store rooms at the Natural History Museum in London.

Taylor was at the museum to continue his research when he noticed that a bone did not match the type of dinosaur that it was listed as. The palaeontologist said that the particular bone “leapt out at [him] as being different”. On closer inspection the student, who has studied that particular type of bone for the past five years, discovered that not only was the bone from a different species of dinosaur but from a totally new family type.

The bone was last examined over one hundred years ago and it was then that it was misidentified. The bone was originally discovered in Sussex in the Hastings area. The area is well known as as a hunting ground for dinosaur bones although the exact location the bone was recovered from has been lost.

The discovery was made from the identification of a single bone. The bone was a part of the creature’s hip and would have been one of a dozen on either side.

This one broken hip bone has led the scientist to believe that the newly discovered creature would have weighed about seven and a half tonnes and been about twenty metres long. The dinosaur would be comparable in size and weight to twelve elephants.

Dr Paul Barret from the Natural History Museum’s palentology department explained 'We have thousands of dinosaur specimens in our collection’. He continued to explain that although they have all been examined, advances in technology and continued examination can lead to all sorts of new and exciting developments.

The dinosaur, named a Xenoposeidon Proneneukus, would have roamed the earth about one hundred and forty million years ago. The name given to the dinosaur means roughly “forward-sloping alien earthquake god”. Taylor’s full paper regarding the dinosaur finding will be available in the journal Palaeontology in November.