New Species of Baby Dino Named for Iconic Korean Cartoon

Researchers from The University of Texas at Austin and the Korean Dinosaur Research Center discovered a new species of baby dinosaur from South Korea’s Aphae Island, which they’ve named Doolysaurus huhmini — a nod to one of South Korea’s most beloved cartoon characters, a baby dinosaur named Dooly.  

“Dooly is one of the very famous, iconic dinosaur characters in Korea. Every generation in Korea knows this character,” said Jongyun Jung, a visiting postdoctoral researcher at UT’s Jackson School of Geosciences who led the research.  

The baby dinosaur is the first new dinosaur species discovered in Korea in 15 years and the first Korean dinosaur fossil found with portions of its skull. The skull bones were revealed when the fossil underwent a scientific micro-CT scan at the University of Texas High-Resolution X-ray Computed Tomography (UTCT) facility, which was established nearly 30 years ago and was the first in the world to make this technology available to the academic research community. 

Doolysaurus lived about 113 million to 94 million years ago during the mid-Cretaceous. Based on its anatomy, the researchers classified it as a thescelosaurid, a type of bipedal dinosaur that lived in East Asia and North America.  

Estimated to be about 2 years old and was still growing when it died, the baby dino is about the size of a turkey, although an adult Doolysaurus may have grown to twice that size and may have been covered in a coat of fuzzy filaments. Researchers could tell the sample was a juvenile by observing growth markers on a thin slice of femur bone. 

“A little cluster of stomach stones, with two leg bones sticking out, indicates that the animal was not fully pulled apart before it hit the fossil record,” said Julia Clarke, who co-authored research about the dinosaur. “So, I encouraged [co-authors Jungyun Jun, Minguk Kim and Hyemin Jo] to visit Texas and the UTCT to try scanning the fossil.” 

Kim and Jo are now using the CT analysis skills they learned at the Jackson School to study more fossils in Korea. Jung said it’s possible that, like Doolysaurus, they’re largely hidden in the rock. He’s hopeful that micro-CT technology can lead to even more dinosaur finds in Korea. 

Read the full story on the Jackson School of Geosciences website.