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Alright, everyone ready for another deep dive?

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Today we're going way back in time.

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We're hanging out with a prehistoric celebrity, in fact.

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Tyrannosaurus Rex.

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I know what you're thinking, T-Rex.

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Really?

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He's like, the dinosaur, right?

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Movies, books, everywhere.

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But trust me, we're going beyond that.

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We're digging into the real science

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to see what T-Rex was all about.

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Yeah, it's really amazing how much we're still learning, too.

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Every fossil find adds something new.

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Totally.

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So to get us started, think about this.

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Picture a creature longer than a school bus.

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That's how big T-Rex was.

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Seriously, could you imagine the thing just like,

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walking around in those teeth?

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Oh man, the teeth.

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We're talking banana-sized teeth here, seriously.

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Some people even call them lethal bananas.

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I mean, you get why.

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Okay, lethal bananas definitely go into my vocabulary.

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And they had those huge skulls to fit them in, right?

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Yeah.

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But always gotta ask.

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Yeah, those arms.

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Like, what was going on there?

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So small.

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You'd think they'd be useless.

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You'd think so, wouldn't you?

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Turns out those puny arms were incredibly strong,

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like bench pressing a piano strong.

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Whoa, no way.

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So much for arm wrestling at T-Rex.

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What about their diet, though?

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What were they using those lethal bananas on?

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Well, their bite was 35 times stronger than a human's.

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Forget chewing.

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They could crush through bone.

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Probably went after triceratops and other big dinos.

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So the ultimate predator, then.

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Or was it more complicated than that?

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It's actually both.

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They definitely hunted, but there's evidence they scavenged, too.

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They were opportunistic, that's for sure.

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Speaking of which, this is going to sound weird,

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but scientists have actually found fossilized T-Rex poop,

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you know, dot-copper lights.

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And we're not talking like little piles here.

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These things were huge, filled with crushed bones and stuff.

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OK, that's a visual, all right.

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But wait, fossilized poop, how's that helpful?

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More than you'd think.

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Those crushed bones tell us they ate bones, not just meat.

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That incredible bite force let them get to the marrow

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inside super nutritious.

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So picture this, you're in a dinosaur stampede, right?

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Who's winning that race?

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I mean, T-Rex was huge, but could they actually

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outrun their prey, you know, like in the movies,

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chasing those jeeps?

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Ah, yeah, the classic T-Rex chase.

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Makes for great movies, but in reality, not so fast.

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Really?

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Yeah, based on their leg, scientists

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think they were about as fast as, well, us.

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Like human running.

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No way, you're telling me all that size and power,

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and they were stuck at, like, jigging speed?

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Pretty much, which means they needed other advantages, right?

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Like their senses.

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Makes sense.

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When you're not the fastest, you got to be smart about it.

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What kind of senses are we talking about here?

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Super hearing, like a bat.

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Hearing was probably good, but imagine

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a sense of smell so strong you could sniff out dinner

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from miles away.

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Seriously?

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That's T-Rex.

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Their olfactory system, the part of the brain for smell,

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was even better than a vultures.

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Wow, vultures are like the smell champions.

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OK, so T-Rex is less about chasing,

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more like sniffing out a buffet.

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What about vision, though?

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Good eyesight.

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Oh, definitely.

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Like most predators, they relied on their eyes,

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positioned forward on the skull, too,

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so they had depth perception, like us.

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No sneaking up on a T-Rex, then.

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They'd see you coming, then smell you, just to be sure.

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OK, so we've got the size, the bite, the nose.

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What about the rest of the look?

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Were they scaly, like lizards?

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That's a big debate.

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We usually picture scales, but there's more and more evidence

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that they might have had feathers.

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Wait, hold on.

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Feathers, like a bird?

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Especially his babies, it seems.

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Like little chicks, maybe with fluffy down.

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OK, a fluffy baby T-Rex is both adorable and terrifying.

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But did the adults keep the feathers?

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That's the million dollar question.

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Fossilized skin is super rare, so we don't know for sure yet.

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All right, so maybe hold off on those scaly T-Rex costumes.

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But you know what we do have?

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Fossils.

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And some of them are amazing, like Sue, the most complete T-Rex

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skeleton ever found.

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Absolutely.

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Sue is a rock star.

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Over 40 feet long, might have weighed nine tons.

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And get this, the bones tell us about their life.

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Hold up, you can tell that from bones.

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Like a tree's rings, you can study growth rings in dinosaur

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bone.

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Sue lived to be about 28 years old.

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That's old for a T-Rex, right?

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Definitely.

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And Sue had a rough life.

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Heal injuries, broken ribs, even arthritis.

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What a survivor.

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See, this is why I love paleontology.

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It's like time traveling detective work.

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But there's one thing about Sue I got to ask.

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We don't actually know if it was a he or a she, right?

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How is that possible?

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Yeah, it's surprisingly tricky.

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Dinosaur skeletons, they don't always

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have obvious differences between sexes.

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But scientists are getting creative.

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They're looking at bone structure,

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even trying to find clues and fossilized eggs.

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For now though, Sue's sex is still a big old mystery.

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See, that's what I love about this stuff.

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Always more to figure out.

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Speaking of which, those tiny arms,

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they just seem so un-T-Rex-like.

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What's the deal there?

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What were they even for?

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Oh, you're not alone.

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Those arms have stumped scientists for ages.

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Lots of theories though.

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Some say balance got to counter that huge head somehow,

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right?

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Others think they were stronger than they looked.

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Maybe for holding on to prey while those lethal bananas

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did their work.

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OK, so maybe underestimate those little arms at your own risk.

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Right.

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Or maybe they were for something we haven't even

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thought of yet.

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That's the cool part, isn't it?

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Totally.

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Always more to discover.

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And hey, speaking of growing, remember

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how fast T-Rex's got big?

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Imagine being a teenager, but you're

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packing on like hundreds of pounds a year.

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Can you imagine the grocery bill?

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Seriously though, their growth rate was insane.

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Scientists figured they could gain over 1,300 pounds per year

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in that teenage growth spurt.

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Wild.

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That's like gaining a whole cow every year.

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All right, so big, strong, great sniffers.

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What about their social lives though?

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Were they loners or did they roll up in packs

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like the T-Rex crew?

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Another good question.

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Most fossils point to them being solitary,

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but there's some debate.

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Maybe during mating season or if there was a ton of food,

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they teamed up.

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Who knows?

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Man, a T-Rex pack would be something else.

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Talk about a site really makes you think,

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even with all we do know, there's still

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so much mystery to them.

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Totally.

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So before we wrap up our T-Rex deep dive,

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let's recap those awesome dino facts.

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We're talking a bone crushing bite 35 times stronger

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than ours, a sense of smell that puts blood hounds to shame.

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And don't forget that growth spurt.

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Plus, we're still learning about how they looked, acted,

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all that.

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It's mind blowing how much we've

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figured out about these creatures

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from millions of years ago.

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But it's also kind of humbling how much we don't know yet.

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Absolutely.

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And that's what keeps it exciting.

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There's always something new waiting to be discovered.

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Couldn't have said it better myself.

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Well, that's all the time we have for today's deep dive.

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Huge thanks to everyone for joining us on this trip.

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Back to the age of the dinosaurs.

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Keep those brains buzzing.

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Keep asking questions.

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And we'll see you next time for another deep dive.