Millions of years ago it may have paid to not get too close to Camarasaurus — but now, scientists have used computing power to create an incredibly detailed model of its skull and muscles for you to inspect.
This model was actually made to help understand the way dinosaurs like this ate — because, despite its size, Camarasaurus was a vegetarian. Indeed, it remains somewhat of a mystery as to how it managed to eat enough to survive while at the same time leaving enough for Diplodocus, which existed alongside it.
This digital reconstruction shows the different bones and muscles of the skull in different colours, based on traces found on the bones of the excavated dinosaurs. Turns out that the two dinosaurs ate rather different foods. “Camarasaurus had a robust skull and strong bite, which would have allowed it to feed on tough leaves and branches. Meanwhile, the weaker bite and more delicate skull of Diplodocus would have restricted it to softer foods like ferns,” David Button, one of the researchers behind the reconstruction, told New Scientist.
In other words: they were eating totally different meals and so left more than enough for each other. [Proceedings of the Royal Society B via New Scientist]