On Wednesday, the Field Museum in Chicago announced it was taking down the fossil tyrannosaur called Sue in order to remount her according to the latest knowledge findings about Tyrannosaurus rex. Sue is probably the most famous fossil in the world, for she is the largest, best-preserved, and most complete T. rex fossil known.
While Sue is undergoing renovation, a new dinosaur, Patagotitan mayorum, will be mounted in her old spot. P. mayorum was a titanosaur, the last surviving group of sauropod dinosaurs. Titanosaurs in general were among the largest and heaviest animals that ever lived, and P. mayorum was no exception. It weighed 70 tons and was 122 feet long, making it the biggest land animal known. It also lived in Argentina about 100 million years ago, millions of years before T. rex prowled western North America.
The P. mayorum skeleton will be unveiled next spring. It will be made from fiberglass, and the bones will be based on those of seven individual dinosaurs. The exhibit will display real bones, including a thigh bone that is 8 feet or 2.4 meters long.
Sue the tyrannosaur was unearthed in 1990 by Sue Hendrickson, and the Field Museum bought her in 1997. After three years of work, the museum put her on display in 2000, and they will take her down in February 2018. Scientists have learned more about T.rex anatomy over the intervening years, and they plan to incorporate that new knowledge in Sue’s renovation. For example, the scientists will add gastralia or rib-like bones around the abdomen that may have helped the dinosaur breathe. They will also make Sue look even more massive. While scientists have known for some time that tyrannosaurs had gastralia, they were not sure how to properly attach them.
The researchers will also correct mistakes. For example, the wrong bone was used as Sue’s wishbone. The scientists will replace it with the correct bone. When the work is completed in 2019, Sue will be placed in a new hall and exhibit designed specifically for her. A $16.5 million gift from the Kenneth C. Griffin Charitable Fund will be paying for both the addition of P. mayorum and Sue’s makeover.
