Scientists Show How Allosaurus Fed Using Multibody Dynamics

Posted on May 22, 2013

Scientists from Ohio University have determined that Allosaurus fed more like a falcon than a crocodile. The research was published here in the journal, Palaeontologia Electronica. The image above shows silhouettes of Allosaurus and a falcon, along with a frightened human for scale.

The scientists used the Allosaurus skeleton known as "Big Al" for the study. Eric Snively, John Cotton, Ryan Ridgely, Lawrence Witmer are pictured with a replica of Big Al above.

Paleontologist Eric Snively, lead author of the new study, said in a statement, "Apparently one size doesn't fit all when it comes to dinosaur feeding styles. Many people think of Allosaurus as a smaller and earlier version of T. rex, but our engineering analyses show that they were very different predators."

Snively and mechanical engineer John Cotton conducted specialized engineering analysis borrowed from robotics called multibody dynamics. This allowed the scientists to run sophisticated simulations of the head and neck movements Allosaurus made when attacking prey and stripping flesh from a carcass. The researchers had to re-flesh the Allosaurus and add soft tissues using clues from the anatomical structure of modern-day dinosaur relatives, such as birds and crocodilians.

Snively says, "Allosaurus was uniquely equipped to drive its head down into prey, hold it there, and then pull the head straight up and back with the neck and body, tearing flesh from the carcass ... kind of like how a power shovel or backhoe rips into the ground."

The researchers say they discovered Allosaurus had a relatively light head after restoring its soft tissues and air sinuses using their reconstruction techniques. The researchers created the following animation of Allosaurus feeding and moving its head. Take a look:

DINOSAURS