Comptonatus chasei Lockwood et al., 2024 (new genus and species)
(Dentary [lower jaw bone] and schematic diagram of the skull of Comptonatus chasei [scale bars = 50 mm for the dentary and 100 mm for the skull diagram], with preserved bones in yellow, from Lockwood et al., 2024)
Meaning of name: Comptonatus = Compton thunderer [in Latin]; chasei = for Nick Chase [discoverer of the original fossil]
Age: Early Cretaceous (Barremian)
Where found: Wessex Formation, Isle of Wight, U.K.
How much is known: Nearly complete skeleton of one individual.
Notes: Comptonatus was an iguanodontian, a diverse group of plant-eating dinosaurs that includes the duck-billed hadrosaurids. It is one of the most completely known iguanodontians from Britain and can be distinguished from other British iguanodontians by numerous anatomical features, including a lower jaw that is essentially straight in side view, as well as an expanded forward-pointing projection on the pubis (one of the hip bones). Historically, all large iguanodontian fossils from the Early Cretaceous of southern England were usually assigned to one of two genera, Mantellisaurus and the more robust Iguanodon, but the discovery of Comptonatus adds to a growing understanding that these dinosaurs were more diverse in this general time and region than previously appreciated.
Reference: Lockwood, J.A.F., D.M. Martill, and S.C.R. Maidment. 2024. Comptonatus chasei, a new iguanodontian dinosaur from the Lower Cretaceous Wessex Formation of the Isle of Wight, southern England. Journal of Systematic Palaeontology 22: 2346573. doi: 10.1080/14772019.2024.2346573
