The gentle giant: Scientists discover plant-eating dinosaur that made even the T-Rex look small



Dinosaur was found in part of Angola that would have been underwater 90million years ago

It has be en dubbed the Angolatitan adamastor - or Angolan giant

Huge: Octavio Mateus with part of a forelimb of the fossilised dinosaur. It is thought to be one of the largest creatures ever to walk on Earth

Scientists in Angola claim they have unearthed one of the largest ever dinosaurs to walk the planet.

Although they have only found the first fossil, it is believed the creature was a long-necked plant eater.

It has been dubbed the Angolatitan adamastor - or Angolan giant.

The international team claims unique skeletal characteristics of the fossilised forelimb bone mean it is part of a previously unknown dinosaur.

The remarkable find is the first in Angola since the 1960s after years of war came to an end.

It was discovered in an area that would have been underwater when the dinosaur was alive 90million years ago.

It is thought the remains, found with fish and shark teeth, might have been washed into the sea and torn apart by ancient sharks.

Matthew Bonnan, a sauropod expert at Western Illinois University, said he believes the team's claim to have discovered a new dinosaur is genuine.



'I think they've been very careful,' he said, adding the find could add to knowledge about how sauropods - or lizard-hipped dinosaurs - adapted to different environments.

Dr Bonnan added it was 'really cool' to see research coming out of Angola.

'The neat thing about dinosaur paleontology is that it's becoming more global,' he said.

'The more people and places that we involve in science, the better off we all are,' Dr Bonnan said.

The findings were published in the Annals of the Brazilian Academy of Science yesterday.

'Angola has had more than its share of civil war,' said Dutch project member Anne Schulp of the Natuurhistorisch Museum Maastricht.

He said science hasn't been a priority, but 'Angola is catching up right now.'

An anti-colonial war broke out in Angola in the 1960s, and civil war followed independence from Portugal in 1975.

Painstaking: Dr Mateus carefully analyses the remains found in an area of Angola which would have been underwater 90million years ago

The fighting ended in 2002 when the army killed rebel leader Jonas Savimbi. The country was left littered with land mines and impoverished. The discovery of oil in recent years has set off an economic boom, but many Angolans have been left behind.

PaleoAngola member Octavio Mateus of Portugal's Universidade Nova de Lisboa and Museum of Lourinha said lack of money has been the greatest barrier to research.

'We don't have problems with land mines, we don't have problems with safety' despite the country's troubled past, Dr Mateus said.

Tatiana Tavares of the Universidade Agostinho Neto is also on the PaleoAngola team, and her Luanda, Angola university has Angolaitan adamastor fossil specimens on public display. Other specimens in Portugal will later be returned to the university.

Dr Mateus discovered the Angolaitan adamastor in 2005. In the years since, excavations and research were completed and a paper was written for review by other scholars, culminating in Wednesday's publication.