EVEN the weakest parts of Tyrannosaurus rex’s skull were built to crush bones and rip flesh.
Many joints in the fearsome creature’s skull were held in place loosely by ligaments, which studies of other animals have shown to be weaker than fused joints. But when Emily Rayfield of the University of Cambridge created a computer model of the internal forces set up by biting and ripping, she found that the results were neatly mirrored by the structure of the T. rex skull.
The strongest compression and shearing forces produced by biting and ripping came at the mid-point of the skull,…
