科学美国人60秒 SSS 史前海洋动物在大餐后死去（打印版）

This is Scientific American's 60-second Science, I'm Christopher Intagliata.

这里是科学美国人——60秒科学系列，我是克里斯托弗·因塔格里塔。

Hundreds of millions of years ago, reptilian predators called ichthyosaurs swam the seas.

亿万年前，名为“鱼龙”的爬行动物捕食者在海洋中游动。

Their fossils look fearsome. But paleobiologist Ryosuke Motani of U.C. Davis says they may have looked more like friendly dolphins.

它们的化石看起来很可怕。但美国戴维斯大学的古生物学专家藻谷亮介表示，它们看起来可能更像友好的海豚。

"Maybe in life ichthyosaurs would have been cute—at least the smaller ones."

“也许在生活中，鱼龙会很可爱——至少体型较小的是如此。”

Motani's team studied one such specimen found in southwest China. It was 240 million years old—15 feet long.

藻谷亮介的团队研究了在中国西南部发现的鱼龙化石。这有2.4亿年历史，15英尺长。

But it seemed to have some extra bones in it—

但它体内似乎有一些多余的骨头，

which Motani's team determined to be the remains of a 13-foot-long thalattosaur, or "sea lizard," the ichthyosaur had swallowed.

藻谷亮介的团队确定那是鱼龙吞下的、13英尺长的海龙或“海蜥蜴”的遗骸。

And, spoiler alert, the only reason they were able to see this animal in the belly of the ichthyosaur is that this gigantic meal never got digested.

剧透一下，他们能在鱼龙腹部看见这种动物的唯一原因是，这顿大餐从未被消化。

The ichthyosaur died soon after swallowing it.

鱼龙吞下它后不久就死了。

Motani was careful to say they're not sure exactly why the ichthyosaur perished. But the specimen has a broken neck.

藻谷亮介谨慎地表示，他们不确定鱼龙死亡的确切原因。但这个标本的颈部骨折了。

So he gave a speculative play-by-play. Perhaps, he says, the ichthyosaur snapped at the sea lizard, but the lizard fought back.

因此他给出了推测性解释。他说，也许鱼龙咬住了海蜥蜴，但蜥蜴反击了。

"And this fight between the two was fierce, probably."

“它们俩之间的战斗可能很激烈。”

So the ichthyosaur fought to subdue its prey, damaging its neck in the process.

因此，鱼龙奋力制服自已的猎物，在这个过程中损伤了脖子。

Then it had to dislodge the prey's bony head and tail from its juicy midsection.

之后，鱼龙不得不将猎物多骨的头部和巴马从多汁液的中段卸掉。

"Now the predator had to do it through jerking and twisting like crocodiles do."

“现在捕食者不得不像鳄鱼一样，通过猛拉和扭转扯掉它们。”

Also bad for the neck. And finally, the ichthyosaur had to swallow the animal—perhaps using inertia or gravity to shove the prey down its gullet.

这对脖子也不利。最后，鱼龙必须吞掉这个动物，可能利用了惯性或重力将猎物推入食道。

"And the chances are, by the time it was ingested,

“很有可能在吞下猎物时，

maybe the neck damage had accumulated to a certain level and maybe the neck could not support the head."

鱼龙脖子的损伤已累积到一定程度，无法再支撑其头部。”

Details of that ancient battle appear in the journal iScience.

这场古代争斗的细节刊登在《iScience》上。

The reason this analysis matters is you can only infer so much about who ate who by looking at teeth.

这篇分析很重要，因为你只能通过观察牙齿来推断谁吃了谁。

This fossil offers direct evidence that these ancient beasts sometimes bit off a whole lot more than they could chew.

这些化石提供了直接的证据，证明这些古老的野兽有时咬下的东西比它们能咀嚼的要多得多。

Thanks for listening for Scientific American's 60-second Science. I'm Christopher Intagliata.

谢谢大家收听科学美国人——60秒科学。我是克里斯托弗·因塔利亚塔。