Iran Press/ Sci & Tech: A batch of newly discovered fossils come from prehistoric giant rhinos, the largest known land mammal in the history of the Earth.
Paleontologists discovered a complete skull from one rhino and three vertebrae from another, in the Linxia basin in the Gansu Province of northwestern China. The set of bones is 26.5 million years old, CNN reported.
Genetic analysis revealed that the fossils belonged to a species of giant rhino that scientists had never seen before. The team of researchers from China and the US dubbed the new animal "Paraceratherium linxiaense."
"Usually fossils come in pieces, but this one is complete, with a very complete skull and a very complete jaw, which is rare," Deng Tao, who led the team that discovered the fossils, told CNN. Deng is a professor at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Taller than a giraffe and roughly the size of six elephants, the rhino towered 23 feet above the ground, and its body was 26 feet long, Deng said. It weighed roughly 24 tons. The skull was more than three feet long.
"It was very rare for a skull of that size to be preserved," Deng said.
Deng and his colleagues shared their findings in a study published in the journal Communications Biology on Thursday.
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