A closer look at Enigmacursor, the newly discovered dinosaur species

A newly discovered species of dinosaur is now on display at London’s Natural History Museum.

Researchers have named this new species Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae, a speedy, two-legged herbivore, 64 centimetres tall and 180 cm long that lived about 145 million to 150 million years ago, during the Late Jurassic Period.

New Scientist spoke to Susannah Maidment, a palaeontologist at the Natural History Museum, who analysed the Enigmacursor specimen, which was uncovered from the Morrison Formation in the western US in 2021-22. The Morrison Formation has produced fossils of some of the most famous dinosaurs in the world, such as Allosaurus and Stegosaurus. But not all of its species are as well-known. Many smaller herbivorous dinosaurs, in particular, have been historically overlooked.

Maidment hopes that this work will shine some light on long-ignored animals of the formation and clear the way for more discoveries in the future.