From the New York Times:
Scientists have uncovered a huge surprise in the Inner Mongolia region of northern China: the fossil skeleton of an unusually robust bird-like dinosaur that lived 70 million years ago. The animal appeared to be a young adult 25 feet long and weighing 3,000 pounds and, if it had lived longer, would probably have grown even larger.Impressed by the size and puzzling character of their find, the team led by Xing Xu, a paleontologist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, classified the animal as a new genus and species. It was given the name Gigantoraptor erlianensis, the specific name recognizing the Erlian basin of Inner Mongolia, where the skeleton was excavated. [Full Text]
