侏羅紀搏擊俱樂部 第121期:水可載舟亦可覆舟

At the base of the tail, where it connects to the hips, Gastonia had these sharp triangular shaped plates made of bone.

在它尾巴基部，連接髖部的位置，加斯頓龍有這些鋒利的三角形的骨質(zhì)護甲。

In and among themselves, they were pretty nasty weapons.

它們本身就是非?？植赖奈淦鳌?/p>

But looking more closely at them, paleontologists saw something amazing.

不過更進一步地觀察它們，古生物學家發(fā)現(xiàn)了一些令人驚訝的東西。

When this dinosaur swung its tail from side to side, these things crossed each other and acted like a pair of bone slicing shears.

當這種恐龍向兩側(cè)擺動尾巴時，這些東西相互交錯，就像一對骨頭切割剪一樣。

The fossil evidence indicated that Gastonia was one of the most well protected dinosaurs ever.

化石證據(jù)表明加斯頓龍是有史以來防護最好的恐龍。

But he had a weakness.

不過它也有弱點。

This large complement of body armor made this dinosaur very slow.

這么巨大的全身鎧甲讓這種恐龍行動遲緩。

Gastonia would have been a relatively slow moving plant-eating dinosaur, it probably spent its day wondering around finding vegetation to eat.

加斯頓龍是一種移動速度相對較慢的植食恐龍，它很可能整天在周圍游蕩尋找能吃的植物。

Because it was so heavily armored, it could only eat low vegetation, so ferns and cycad plants and low-lying shrubs.

因為它身披重甲，只能吃到較低的植物就是蕨類、蘇鐵類植物和低矮的樹叢。

Then, the investigation took an unexpected turn.

之后的調(diào)查有了意料之外的轉(zhuǎn)折。

Lawrence Witmer of Ohio University using CT scans to peer through the armored skulls of dinosaurs like Gastonia.

俄亥俄大學的勞倫斯·維特莫利用CT掃描來觀察加斯頓龍這樣的恐龍帶甲的頭顱內(nèi)部。

What he discovered was intriguing.

他發(fā)現(xiàn)的事情非常有趣。

Scientists now know that this "tank" was not an intelligent dinosaur, but had a powerful sense of smell and hearing.

科學家們現(xiàn)在知道這種“坦克”不是很聰明的恐龍，但是有很強的嗅覺和聽覺能力。

When we look at the brain of Ankylosaurs like Gastonia, what we see is still a relatively simple kind of structure.

在觀察加斯頓龍這類甲龍的腦部時，我們看到的是相對比較簡單的結(jié)構(gòu)。

One thing that is kind of expanded though is the olfactory centers, the centers associated with the sense of smell.

有一部分比較膨大就是其嗅覺中樞，這部分大腦跟氣味感覺相關(guān)。

They're actually considerably enlarged suggesting that smell was very important to these animals.

它們其實相當大，這說明嗅覺對于這些動物來說很重要。

We also see, in the inner ear of these animals, that the part associated with hearing was also remarkably well developed suggesting that hearing as well as smell were particularly important.

我們還看到，這些動物的內(nèi)耳，與聽覺相關(guān)的那部分，同樣也相當發(fā)達，表明聽覺對于它們來說也和嗅覺一樣非常重要。

But the CT scans uncovered something else.

不過CT掃描還揭示了其它情況。

The vision centre of the skull showed that Gastonia had poor eyesight.

其頭顱里的視覺中樞表明加斯頓龍的視力不佳。

In the brain, we don't see tremendous expansion of the optic centers, the visual centers associated with processing visual information.

在它的腦部，看不到視覺中樞有特別明顯的膨大，視覺中樞與處理視覺信號有關(guān)。

They have a really low head posture, these are not animals that can in a sense scan the horizon for predators, and so vision really would only be useful at close distances in terms of seeing a predator.

這些動物的頭部體位很低，它們不是在某種意義上能掃視地平線上掠食者的動物，所以就看到掠食者來說，其視覺只有觀察近距離時才會有用。