(Web Desk) - In the Cretaceous period, the most advanced herbivorous dinosaurs, known as hadrosaurs, were known to have formidable teeth.
In a new study, it has been revealed that these dinosaurs had developed thousands of teeth because of their voracious appetite for plants.
The researchers looked into the evolutionary trajectory of the ornithopods, which was a group of dinosaurs that encompassed Iguanodon, Hypsilophodon, rare rhabdodontids and the hadrosaurs.
At the end of the Cretaceous period, these herbivorous dinosaurs were reigning across vast swathes of the planet.
In the research, headed by Dr. Attila Ősi from Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary, it was highlighted that the teeth and jaws of ornithopods went through drastic changes during their evolution.
The Iguanodon, which was an early member of the ornithopods, needed more than 200 days to form their teeth and it took the same amount of time for the teeth to wear out because of chewing.
In the later part of the Cretaceous, the hadrosaurs were seen gnawing through their teeth in just 50 days.
As per the researchers, the ornithopods indulged in binge-eating of tough plants because of which their teeth eroded rapidly.
The dinosaurs had to deploy reinforcements and create reserves of teeth in their skulls which prevented them from going hungry.
“Across a herbivore’s life, its teeth gradually wear down,” said study co-author Professor Paul Barrett.
Because of the constant wear and tear, the tooth eventually vanished in some of the dinosaurs.
The reptiles, however, solved this dental dilemma by producing new teeth continuously. Because of this dinosaur teeth have today become the holy grail for researchers who wish to understand early animal evolution.
“At the start, they had single rows of fairly simple teeth with limited wear, probably because these dinosaurs focused on fruits and softer plants,” Professor Paul said.
These early ornithopods turned into hadrosaurs who had numerous teeth, which had ridges on the one side and large blade-like edges on the other side.
According to scientists, the evolution of tough teeth occurred because of the kind of plants these dinosaurs ate.