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Dinosaurs are a group of reptiles that have lived on Earth for about 245 million years.
In 1842, the English naturalist Sir Richard Owen coined the term Dinosauria, derived from the Greek deinos, meaning “fearfully great,” and sauros, meaning “lizard.”
Dinosaur fossils have been found on all seven continents.
All non-avian dinosaurs went extinct about 66 million years ago.
There are roughly 700 known species of extinct dinosaurs.
Modern birds are a kind of dinosaur because they share a common ancestor with non-avian dinosaurs.
Plant-eating dinosaurs had teeth of various shapes designed for their particular diets. Triceratops, for example, had hundreds of teeth that formed a solid “wall” with sharp ridges. The teeth were used to chop off vegetation. Other plant eaters, such as Anatotitan, had wide flat teeth that they used to grind up tough vegetation. The long-necked dinosaurs, such as Diplodocus, had long pencil-like teeth that they used to rake the leaves off branches. These dinosaurs swallowed the leaves whole. They also ingested small stones, called gastroliths, most likely to grind up the food in their stomachs, much the same way modern birds, such as parakeets and chickens, do today.Contrary to what many people think, not all dinosaurs lived during the same geological period. Stegosaurus, for example, lived during the Late Jurassic Period, about 150 million years ago. Tyrannosaurus rex lived during the Late Cretaceous Period, about 72 million years ago. Stegosaurus was extinct for 66 million years before Tyrannosaurus walked on Earth.
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