Detecting dozens of zooplankton dinosaur eggs

This is the first time scientists have discovered thousands of footprints and many egg nests of the Theropoda dinosaur in the east of the Gobi Desert in Mongolia.

Therizinosaur is a member of the Theropoda carnivorous dinosaur group (including Tyrannosaurus Rex) that lived about 70 million years ago.

Photo: Livescience

Yoshitsugu Kobayashi, a researcher of vertebrate organisms, said the team discovered these dinosaur eggs in Southeastern Mongolia in 2011. Earlier, scientists discovered thousands of Dinosaur footprints also belong to the family Theropoda in Montana state - USA and Portugal.

They unearthed 17 dinosaurs with about 75 eggs. The round eggs are about 13 cm in diameter with a rough outer shell. The newly found eggs did not contain dinosaur embryos, most of them had holes in their heads that proved to have hatched.

Photo: Livescience

Based on the size and species analyzes found in nearby areas, the team concluded that the Therizinosaurs dinosaurs spawn and weigh about 99kg when mature. Previously, researchers still thought that the dinosaur belonging to the family Theropoda had a separate life. However, the discovery of Therizinosaurus' remains reveals that they also have a collective life during the reproductive period.

The findings have just been published by researchers from Hokkaido University - Japan and the Mongolian Academy of Sciences at the 73rd American vertebrate science conference held in Los Angeles - USA.