T. rex tooth analysis points to elephant-like body warmth
SCIENCEUnverifiedUpdated:
Three T. rex teeth from Montana’s Hell Creek Formation have reportedly yielded temperature estimates around an elephant’s body temperature, adding a direct mineral-based measurement to a long-running debate over dinosaur physiology.
Inferring body temperature from tooth isotopes
Researchers reportedly used clumped isotope thermometry—a method that infers formation temperature from bonds between heavy isotopes in tooth enamel—to examine three T. rex teeth.
The reported measurements ranged from 34.7°C to 37.3°C. The researchers argue the results support T. rex being a homeothermic endotherm, meaning an animal that maintains a relatively stable temperature using metabolic heat, while acknowledging that the question remains unsettled and that three teeth cannot fully exclude seasonal bias.
Whether T. rex generated enough internal heat to sustain its active lifestyle remained unresolved, with prior evidence largely indirect.
A reported isotope analysis of three T. rex teeth estimates an average body temperature of 36.3°C, plus or minus 2.5°C, closer to large mammals such as elephants than to the contemporary crocodilians tested for comparison.
The limits of a three-tooth result
The measurement is presented as a way to sidestep a limitation of earlier oxygen-isotope estimates, which depended partly on the extinct animal’s unknown body-water composition. If borne out by more samples, it would strengthen the case that T. rex stayed warmer than its environment rather than merely tracking ambient conditions.
Sources
- Ars TechnicaT. rex teeth indicate it ran as warm as an elephantRead source →