T-rex, or Tyrannosaurus rex, was a beast with a match weight of about 9 tons and a length of 13 metres. But contrary to what was previously believed, its newly hatched young were as small as cats.
It was while British palaeontologists at the University of Bath were going through old bone collections that they accidentally found what turned out to be the first fossils of newborn tyrannosaurs.
Calculations show that the chicks weighed around two kilograms and were 75 centimetres long. When they were fully hatched, they probably weighed even less, around 1.7 kilograms, the researchers say on
Based on the discovery, the researchers have concluded that tyrannosaur eggs were likely very small and numerous: 20 to 30 per clutch. The study is published in the journal Biology.
