trichomonosis

The plague of tyrants - a common bird parasite that infected Tyrannosaurus

edyong | October 6, 2009

At 13 metres in length, Tyrannosaurus rex had little to fear from other predators. But it was occasionally attacked by an enemy far smaller than itself. In a wonderful piece of forensic palaeontology, Ewan Wolff from the University of Wisconsin has shown that the tyrant lizard king was often infected by a microscopic parasite, whose relatives still infect the birds of today. Potentially transmitted through bites from other tyrannosaurs, the parasite could have starved the infected animals to death. Many of the large meat-eating dinosaurs have wounds on their heads that were clearly inflicted…