First Fossilized Dino Brain

A little over 130 million years ago, a dinosaur was roaming the area of Sussex, England, until he became trapped by the muds of a thick swamp, and his death was forgotten. Today, its brain has been identified as the first preserved dinosaur brain in history.

The brain was discovered by fossil hunter Jamie Hiscocks in 2004. Dr. David Norman, a British palaeontologist from the University of Cambridge's Department of Earth, is part of the team of researchers who analyzed the fossil. “It’s not the entire brain, it’s just remarkable preservation of soft tissues you wouldn’t expect to have preserved.” said David Norman.

The fossil is the size of a pebble and was still preserved inside the skull when discovered. Experts agreed that the pebble was a dinosaur fossil, but they hardly expected to find that it contained the mineralized remnants of soft tissue, much less the first recorded dinosaur brain in history.

According to scientists, a dinosaur's brain has never been discovered before and was never considered possible. The reason for this was explained by researchers as: “the fossil, was preserved due to the dinosaur dying in a swamp-like environment.”

Mixed low levels of oxygen, swamp-like environments are known to slow decay and acidity which can preserve soft tissue for long periods of time. The small size of the fossil most likely comes from the way the dinosaur died, the fossil also appeared to have belonged to a mammal.

It is believed that the dinosaur got there by sinking into a stagnant pond after its death, flipping belly up, and as it sank into the pond its head was left upside down, partially buried into the lake bed. Scientists have already known for quite some time that dinosaurs had brains, and they think that their brains would appear looking like a crocodile's or a bird's brain.

Dr Norman thinks that the finding will help get paleontologists to investigate their fossils more carefully because you never know what might be hiding within them. While they are just at the start of figuring out what information the brain can provide, the fact that it was found suggests that the world is full of other valuable fossils just waiting to be discovered.