'Fearsome Beast': This New Dinosaur Species Is 'Closest Thing To Real-Life Dragon'

Dragons may be a thing of legends, but it turns out that some of the dinosaurs that once ruled the Earth may have been like these mythical creatures. In a new study, a team of researchers has described a dinosaur species that is as close to a real dragon as we can get.

The fossil of this rather unique pterosaur was discovered in a quarry in northwest Queensland in 2011, The University of Queensland (UQ) said in its news release. Based on the crested mandible specimen, the researchers determined that its skull, which contained about 40 teeth, would have been about a meter long and it would have had a 7-meter wingspan.

"It's the closest thing we have to a real-life dragon," study lead, Tim Richards of UQ's Dinosaur Lab, said in the news release. "The new pterosaur, which we named Thapunngaka shawi, would have been a fearsome beast, with a spear-like mouth and a wingspan around seven meters. It was essentially just a skull with a long neck, bolted on a pair of long wings."

An artist's impression of the flying dinosaur shows how just how fearsome it would have looked.

Pterosaur fossils in Australia are "exceptionally rare," the researchers noted in their study, published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. In fact, in Australia, less than 20 specimens have been described since the continent's first pterosaur fossil was discovered some 40 years ago. According to UQ, this is because they were "perfectly adapted to powered flight," thus having rather hollow bones that end up being "poorly preserved."

Researchers determined that this particular species was among a group of pterosaurs called anhanguerians, which were found in every continent.

"It is the fourth named pterosaur species from Australia and, based on crest size, represents the largest pterosaur currently known from Australia, the largest mandibular crest known from any anhanguerian, and the third-largest anhanguerian pterosaur known worldwide," the researchers wrote.

In naming the "fearsome beast," the researchers incorporated words from one of the languages spoken by the Wanamara Nation, "on whose Country the holotype was found."

"The genus name, Thapunngaka, incorporates thapun [ta-boon] and ngaka [nga-ga], the Wanamara words for 'spear' and 'mouth,' respectively," study co-author, Steve Salisbury, said in the UQ news release. "The species name, shawi, honors the fossil's discoverer Len Shaw, so the name means 'Shaw's spear mouth.'"

According to the researchers, the discovery "greatly" contributes to the understanding of Australian pterosaurs, noting that its pterosaur record is still "comparatively poor" but improving. With the discovery of the Thapunngaka shawi, the researchers showed that "large crested pterosaurs," which rivaled the size of the ones in South America, Europe and North Africa, were also around in Australia during the Early Cretaceous.

"[G]iven the more diverse pterosaur assemblages found in South America and China, this new discovery continues to provide optimism that additional Australian species will be found in the future," the researchers wrote.