Hot-Headed Dinosaurs

Been busy battling some christians that have been trying to pound their religion in my head, and I cannot let that happen. They have their beliefs and I have mine. A couple of these so-called "Christians" has already begun making fun of my weight problems. That's OK! They think I'm fat, I think they're stupid, so it kinda evens out! LOL! I've decided I'll let them have their fun for a while, and then when they get too boring, I will stop accepting their comments. In truth, they've already gotten a bit boring, and ANNOYING!!! Anna's right, Bible-thumpers are very annoying!! But anyway, in the midst of all this I have found yet another interesting article. This one about dino-sinuses. It even says that dinosaurs may have got infections like we do, and I hate those!! But the big, empty sinuses made the heads of dinosaurs easy to carry on their long, relatively slender necks.

Here's the link: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/12/09/dinosaur-skull-sinus.html

Sinus-Laden Dino Skulls Reveal Hotheaded Life
Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News

Dec. 9, 2008 -- A fully fleshed out Tyrannosaurus rex head may have weighed more than 1,100 pounds, but much of that volume was filled with air, according to a new study that suggests all dinosaurs were airheads.

Scientists have discovered that dinos possessed more air cavities in their heads than was previously believed, including many sinuses -- the same cavities that can lead to sinus headaches and infections in people.

"Dinosaurs likely suffered from nasty sinus infections," co-author Lawrence Witmer told Discovery News.

"In fact, we have other evidence that these infections spread to their bones, so dinosaurs could have suffered from painful, pounding headaches at times," added Witmer, a professor of paleontology at Ohio University's College of Osteopathic Medicine.

He and colleague Ryan Ridgely CT scanned and 3-D imaged four dinosaur skulls: two fierce carnivores and two plant eaters. The meat eaters were T. rex and Majungasaurus, while the herbivores were represented by Panoplosaurus and Euoplocephalus, both ankylosaurian dinosaurs, which had armored bodies and short snouts.

The findings were recently published in The Anatomical Record.

"Scientists like myself tend to look at dinosaur brains, bones, eyeballs and such, but airway systems, essentially empty spaces in the skull, sort of slipped between the research cracks over the years and did not receive much attention," Witmer said.

The study revealed that predatory dinosaur heads featured large olfactory areas with an arching airway extending from the nostrils to the throat, along with the many sinus cavities. The air spaces made the skull bones hollow, similar to strong, yet lightweight, hollow beams used in construction work.

The analysis allowed the scientists to more accurately determine the weight of fleshed out dinosaur heads. Majungasaurus' head weighed around 70 pounds, but the 1,100-pound-plus head of T. rex took them aback.

"That's more than the combined weight of the whole starting lineup of the Cleveland Cavaliers," Witmer said.

The heads of the plant-eating dinosaurs were lighter, but they featured twisty corkscrewed air passageways that Witmer likened to "crazy straws," the swirly drinking straws favored by kids.

One function of this complex network of nasal cavities was heat transfer, the researchers believe, since blood vessels ran alongside their nasal passages, allowing air to pass over the moist surfaces, cooling the blood and therefore removing excess heat from their heads.

"Most big dinosaurs would have had a problem of being too hot," Witmer said. "We now think these were warm blooded animals. You can imagine them sitting out under the Cretaceous sun."
"They created shade, but didn't often find it," he added.

The scientists also believe the nasal passages acted as resonating chambers, giving each dino its own unique "voice." It's possible that armored dinosaurs, in particular, could recognize individuals based on their vocalizations alone.

CT scans of crocodiles and ostriches found similar -- although not quite so prominent -- head air spaces, adding to the evidence that these creatures are distantly related to dinosaurs. Their collective common ancestor must have passed down the trait.

Michael Ryan, coordinator of research and head of vertebrate paleontology at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, told Discovery News that Witmer's lab has "been the cutting edge for investigating what's going on inside of the fossil dinosaur skulls that we so painstakingly dig up."

"The new information about the convoluted nasal passages of ankylosaurs gives us the very first suggestion that these weird herbivorous dinosaurs may have had complex vocal patterns," Ryan said. "It turns out that the Late Cretaceous may have been as noisy as a frog pond during mating season, with the air being full of honks, chirps and squeaks."

Ryan added, "It's work like this that helps us to better understand these dinosaurs as once living animals."