Giant sea lizard fossil shows diversity of life before asteroid hit

A giant mosasaur from the end of the Cretaceous period in Morocco that could have reached up to eight metres long is the third new species to be described from the region in less than a year, bringing the total number of species up to at least 13. The high diversity of the fauna shows how mosasaurs, giant marine lizards related to snakes and Komodo dragons, thrived in the final million years of the Cretaceous period before they, and most of all species on Earth, were wiped out by the impact of a giant asteroid 66 million years ago. "Many aquatic snakes and lizards - sea snakes, filesnakes, water monitors- flick their forked tongues underwater, using chemical cues to track their prey. Mosasaurs would have resembled whales and dolphins, so it's tempting to assume they lived like them." Some had small teeth for seizing fish and squid, others evolved blunt teeth to crush crustaceans, clams, and ammonites, while others had teeth designed to cut or tear apart other marine animals - including other mosasaurs. Pluridens brings the number of mosasaurs known from latest Cretaceous of Morocco up to 13, but the researchers suggest it's unlikely to be the last new species. "Co-author on the study, Dr Nour-Eddine Jalil from the Natural History Museum of Sorbonne University said:"It's a new species of a large predator which, with its eight metre length, comes to confirm the diversity of the faunas of the seas just before the Cretaceous crisis. Nicholas Longrich, Nathalie Bardet, Fatima Khaldoune Oussama, Khadiri Yazami Nour-Eddine Jalil "Pluridens serpentis, a new mosasaurid from the Maastrichtian of Morocco and implications for mosasaur diversity" DOI: 10.1016/j.