World's Largest Dinosaur Fossil Field Claimed

A field of dinosaur bones found earlier this year in China may be the largest in the world, scientists claim.

More than 7,600 fossils have been found in the dig, which is in Zhucheng City in eastern Shandong Province, according to paleontologist Zhao Xijin of the the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, state media reports.

Zhao said the fossils dated mainly from the Late Cretaceous of the Mesozoic Period, when dinosaurs became extinct, according to the Xinhua news agency report.

"The discoveries are expected to contribute to research on the mystery of dinosaur extinction," Zhao said.

The city is known for bones. It has a major field of large hadrosaurus fossils, discovered in the 1960s. More than 50 tons of fossils are said to have been discovered since then.

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