A group of children found a rare fossil “Teen Rex”! It will allow scientists to study the evolution of the species

Perhaps the largest known tyrannosaurus, a specimen named Sue on display at the Field Museum in Chicago, is 12.3 meters long.
A rare fossil of a juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex discovered recently in the wilds of North Dakota is a discovery worthy of attention because it may offer better scientific insight into the life history of this famous dinosaur and because of the story of the group of children who found it.

Information about the discovery of the fossil, dubbed “Teen Rex,” was announced Tuesday by the Denver Museum of Natural Sciences, where it will be on display and studied.

In July 2022, brothers Liam and Jessin Fisher, who were 7 and 10 at the time, and their cousin Kaiden Madsen, who was 9, were hiking and searching for fossils with Sam Fisher, Liam and Jessin’s father, about 10 miles from town Marmarth in southwestern North Dakota. There Liam and his father noticed a huge bone sticking out of the ground. They concluded that it was a dinosaur bone.
Sam Fisher informed paleontologist Tyler Lyson, a Marmarth native and high school classmate who became curator of the Department of Vertebrate Paleontology at the Denver Museum of Natural History, about the discovery.

Tyrannosaurus rex fossil could change what we know about dinosaurs.

After Lyson received mining permits in July 2023, everyone returned to the site. On the first day of the dig, two adults discovered the lower jaw from which several large T. rex teeth protruded, Lyson later recounted.

Tyrannosaurus, which roamed the western part of North America, was one of the largest carnivorous dinosaurs. This tyrannosaurus appears to have been about 13 to 15 years old and still needed a third to reach the size of an adult dinosaur. It was about 7.6 meters long and weighed 1,600 kilograms. A T. rex can be said to be fully grown when it reaches between 18 and 21 years of age.

Perhaps the largest known tyrannosaurus, a specimen named Sue on display at the Field Museum in Chicago, is 12.3 meters long.

The boys worked with family friend Dr. Tyler Lyson, assistant curator of paleontology at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science.

Hell Creek: The Last Dinosaur Ecosystem on Earth

The fossil was found in the Hell Creek area where “the last dinosaur ecosystem on Earth was preserved” just before the mass extinction, Lyson said.
The fossils were found on soft sandstone because the animal’s body apparently ended up on a sandbar in an ancient river system during its lifetime. The completeness of the skeleton is unclear because numerous bones remain embedded in the three-ton stone, which is now being studied at the museum.

In addition to part of the leg, there appears to be a lot of skull remains, parts of a femur and some vertebrae, Lyson said.
“A young specimen of T.rex will allow us to discover how this type of tyrannosaurus developed and what physical changes occurred during growth,” Lyson explained, adding that only a few such fossils are available for study today.
The excavation of the fossils was recorded by a crew of documentary shows, and the film “T. REX” will air in America on June 21.