VOA新闻杂志2024--美国三名男孩发现罕见未成年霸王龙化石

Children Find Dinosaur¹ ‘Teen-Rex’ Fossil in North Dakota

Two brothers, Liam and Jessin Fisher, were hiking in North Dakota with their father and cousin, Kaiden Madsen, during the summer of 2022.

They were looking for dinosaur fossils.

And they found one.

Liam and his father, Sam, noticed a large leg bone sticking out of the ground.

They shouted to the others to come and look.

“They came running," said Liam, who is now nine years old. "And dad asked, 'What is this?' And Jessin said, 'That's a dinosaur.'"

Two years later, experts removed the fossils from the ground and the remains² of a young Tyrannosaurus rex are now at a museum in Colorado where people can see them.

The dinosaur is being called “Teen Rex” because it was not yet an adult when it died.

The Denver Museum of Nature and Science announced the find in early June. The fossil will be displayed and studied for years to come.

Jessin is now 12. When he saw the leg bone, he was sure it was a dinosaur, but he did not know what kind it was.

His father, Sam, contacted a childhood friend, Tyler Lyson, a scientist who studies dinosaurs³ and works at the museum in Denver. He sent a photo and Lyson started working on the permissions required to do an excavation⁴. Last year, everyone went back to the place to start working.

At first, the group thought the bone belonged to a smaller plant-eating dinosaur. But later that day, Lyson said he and Jessin found the lower jaw⁵ and some large T. rex teeth.

“It still gives me goosebumps,” Lyson said.

"I was completely, like, speechless," said Kaiden, who is now 11.

Tyrannosaurus rex was one of the largest meat-eating dinosaurs. Scientists say it lived in what is now North America about 67 million years ago. All dinosaurs disappeared about 66 million years ago.

The scientists say the young T. rex was 13 to 15 years old. These dinosaurs are considered fully⁶ grown starting at 18 years. The “Teen Rex” was about 7.6 meters long, about two-thirds the size of an adult. One fossil, named Sue, which is displayed at the Field Museum in Chicago is 12.3 meters.

Lyson said the Denver display will not be as big as the display in Chicago because much of it is still contained in a large piece of rock. He said they have a hip⁷ bone, the skull⁸ and a number of vertebrae, which are back bones.

The fossil was found in a piece of soft stone, called sandstone. This leads the scientists to believe the dinosaur got stuck on a sandy area in the middle of a river.

Lyson said scientists are interested in finding ways that younger T. rexes were different from older ones. They were faster and had smaller heads. Because of this, the scientists think the young dinosaurs had a different diet than the older ones.

There are very few young Tyrannosaurus fossils available. A younger one is at the Burpee Museum in Rockford, Illinois.

Lyson said the new discovery should help dinosaur researchers understand another theory. A small number of scientists believe a dinosaur, called Nanotyrannus, was related to T. rex and lived at the same time.

A movie about the discovery with scientists from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science is expected to be released on June 21.

Words in This Story

hike –v. to walk or a long distance in a natural area

cousin –n. the children of the brother or sister of a person’s father

fossil –n. the remains of a living thing that have turned into rock below the ground over a very long amount of time

display –v. to show especially in an exhibit for the public

excavation –n. a big digging operation involving heavy equipment or organized effort

goosebumps –n. (pl.) small bumps that form on the skin when people are excited or fearful

1 dinosaur   

n.恐龙

参考例句：

• Are you trying to tell me that David was attacked by a dinosaur?你是想要告诉我大卫被一支恐龙所攻击？
• He stared at the faithful miniature of the dinosaur.他凝视著精确的恐龙缩小模型。

2 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

3 dinosaurs   

n.恐龙( dinosaur的名词复数 )；守旧落伍的人，过时落后的东西

参考例句：

• The brontosaurus was one of the largest of all dinosaurs. 雷龙是所有恐龙中最大的一种。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Dinosaurs have been extinct for millions of years. 恐龙绝种已有几百万年了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 excavation   

n.挖掘，发掘；被挖掘之地

参考例句：

• The bad weather has hung up the work of excavation.天气不好耽误了挖掘工作。
• The excavation exposed some ancient ruins.这次挖掘暴露出一些古遗迹。

5 jaw   

n.颚，颌，说教，流言蜚语；v.喋喋不休，教训

参考例句：

• He delivered a right hook to his opponent's jaw.他给了对方下巴一记右钩拳。
• A strong square jaw is a sign of firm character.强健的方下巴是刚毅性格的标志。

6 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

7 hip   

n.臀部，髋；屋脊

参考例句：

• The thigh bone is connected to the hip bone.股骨连着髋骨。
• The new coats blouse gracefully above the hip line.新外套在臀围线上优美地打着褶皱。

8 skull   

n.头骨；颅骨

参考例句：

• The skull bones fuse between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five.头骨在15至25岁之间长合。
• He fell out of the window and cracked his skull.他从窗子摔了出去，跌裂了颅骨。