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Small Animal With Thick Dragon Like Scales

The Komodo dragon is 1 of the most fearsome animals to roam the planet. These giant monitor lizards can grow upwards to 10 feet long and an average adult in the wild weighs upward to 150 pounds—though at that place accept been reports of ane toppling the scales at 366 pounds. In their native habitat, they have no predators and therefore dominate over the chain of Indonesian islands they call home. Stealthy and quick, they likewise have a superior immune arrangement to stave off illness. With everything going for them, information technology may not seem similar they need some other reward, but researchers accept just discovered an extra layer of protection on their bodies.

In a recently published report, a grouping of scientists found that Komodo dragons actually have a conform of armor fabricated from tiny bones nether their scales. This bony "chain mail" was discovered after a deceased adult specimen underwent a powerful CT browse. These tiny bones are called osteoderms and are nowadays in many dissimilar lizards, frogs, and crocodile species. While information technology's non surprising that osteoderms are part of the Komodo dragon'due south anatomy, this is the first fourth dimension it's been examined in detail—and the findings are incredible!

The developed dragon scanned was one of the oldest living specimens living in captivity. Donated past the Fort Worth Zoo, it had lived 19.5 years and its advanced historic period made for an incredibly complex adapt of armor. In fact, the shapes and coverage of the osteoderms differ quite a bit from other lizards. Interestingly, when the researchers did the aforementioned scan on a baby Komodo dragon specimen, at that place were no osteoderms to be found.

Bony plates called osteoderms (colored orangish) cover the skull of an adult Komodo dragon. (Photo: The University of Texas at Austin)

This led the team to an intriguing conclusion. Every bit Komodo dragons are apex predators, their armor isn't protecting them against other species. Rather, it's giving them a fighting chance when in boxing against other Komodo dragons. The explanation is also logical, given the absenteeism of this protective layer in babies.

"Immature komodo dragons spend quite a fleck of time in trees, and when they're big plenty to come out of the trees, that'south when they start getting in arguments with members of their own species," Professor Christopher Bong of the UT Jackson School of Geosciences, a co-author on the study, explains. "That would exist a time when extra armor would assist."

To sympathise a bit more near how unique the osteoderm of a Komodo dragon is, it'due south of import to empathise that most lizards have one or two bone shapes in the osteoderm and large areas of the head completely costless of armor. Instead, the adult Komodo dragon has a head almost entirely encased in armor.

"Nosotros were actually blown away when nosotros saw it," says scientist Jessica Maisano, who runs the CT facility and led the enquiry. "Nigh monitor lizards just take these vermiform (worm-shaped) osteoderms, but this guy has four very singled-out morphologies, which is very unusual across lizards."

While the presence of osteoderms in Komodo dragons were first recorded in the 1920s, there's a good reason we're just discovering more most them now. Since they reside within the skin—and this is the first thing removed when making a skeleton—information technology'due south been hard to learn more about how they were formed or arranged. The CT scanner used at the Academy of Texas's Loftier-Resolution X-ray Computed Tomography Facility is similar to those used clinically, only uses college-energy Ten-rays and can produce more detail. This allowed the researchers to digitally reconstruct the skeletons.

Komodo dragons have a circuitous accommodate of armor fabricated from tiny bones that are embedded within their peel.

Komodo dragon osteoderms. The insets show the four basic osteoderm shapes plant on the adult specimen. From acme to bottom: rosette; platy; dendritic; and vermiform. (Photo: The University of Texas at Austin)

This visualization of the CT browse shows just how much protection this armor provides these apex predators.

h/t: [IFL Scientific discipline!]

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