Mummified dinosaur reveals surprises: scientists

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A partially mummified hadrosaur discovered by a teenager in North Dakota may be the most complete dinosaur ever found, with intact skin that shows evidence of stripes and perhaps soft tissue, researchers said on Monday.

Enough of the animal remains to show it ran quickly and was far more muscular than scientists believed such dinosaurs were.

"It's sort of King Tut meets T. Rex," paleontologist Phil Manning of the University of Manchester in Britain said in a telephone interview.

The creature is fossilized, with the skin and bone turned to stone. But unlike most dinosaur fossils, tissues are preserved as well.

This includes large expanses of the animal's skin, with clear remains of scales.

"This is not a skin impression. This is fossilized skin," Manning said. "When you run your hands over this dinosaur's skin, this is the closest you are going to get to touching a real dinosaur, ever."

The remains of the hadrosaur, dubbed Dakota, were found in 2000 by Tyler Lyson, then 17, on his uncle's ranch in North Dakota.

The hadrosaur, a plant-eating dinosaur that walked on two legs, lived 67 million years ago, during the late Cretaceous Period.