Paleontologists reappraise description of duck-billed hadrosaurs

The duck-billed dinosaurs (hadrosaurs) may not be as glamorous as tyrannosaurs (and most tyrannosaur researchers sure don’t respect these “Cretaceous food items” anyhow), but in many ways they are a far more interesting and scientifically viable group to study. Hadrosaurs are known from literally tons of fossils from around the world, often with nearly complete skeletons and frequent soft-tissue preservation. As a result, you can answer a lot of research questions with hadrosaurs that are difficult to address with more rare groups. But, surprisingly (or perhaps not surprisingly, given many people’s inexplicable preference for the sharp-in-tooth-and-claw tyrannosaurs), lots of basic research on hadrosaurs remains. This is a golden opportunity for scientists!