Lokiceratops rangiformis, a new centrosaurine from the Judith River Formation

[CarnotaurusKing]

https://peerj.com/articles/17224/

https://novataxa.blogspot.com/2024/06/lokiceratops.html?m=1

Further proof of the extreme endemism in the dinosaurs of Campanian Laramidia. Also suggests the presence of a new clade Albertaceratopsini, composed of Lokiceratops, Albertaceratops, and Medusaceratops.

Pretty nifty ornamentation and it looks pretty big too. Would make for a good new model by PNSO, HLG or Safari Ltd.

[Turkeysaurus]

Cool name
Cool Horns
Good size
I agree this has everything to make a good toy




Scale bar is 2 meters

[andrewsaurus rex]

Indeed a good size.  Pentaceratops size or at the lower range of Triceratops.   The asymmetrical frill horns are interesting.   I wonder if it's an aberration of this specimen or a trait of the species.   Somewhat like asymmetrical caribou antlers.  But those are shed every season, which is a big part of the reason they are asymmetrical.

New fodder for BOTM and Mattel. 

[Pliosaurking]

What an Awesome looking ceratopsian! The name is also cool. I agree this could be a great species to make into figure form.

[Sim]

There's a Styracosaurus specimen with one additional horn on one side of its frill, but other specimens look more symmetrical.  My guess is that this Lokiceratops specimen is like that Styracosaurus specimen in being asymmetrical.

[Carnoking]

Judith River was a happening place

[Faelrin]

@Sim I was wondering the same. Hard to know if this is individual variation, or if this was more widespread, when there is only one specimen though.

[Quiversaurus]

Not a huge fan of ceratopsians, but I like the name. Very apt, with those horns.

And of course because it's "Loki", there's the characteristic green shades as well. Very nice (:

[Ludodactylus]

There's a Styracosaurus specimen with one additional horn on one side of its frill, but other specimens look more symmetrical.  My guess is that this Lokiceratops specimen is like that Styracosaurus specimen in being asymmetrical.

That was my immediate thought as well. Either way, it's a very cool looking specimen.

[stargatedalek]

Are people genuinely trying to say the whole species was asymmetrical? That is such an extreme thing to assume. There are (IIRC) Torosaurus and Styracosaurus specimens that show asymmetry. When you have an animal with a lot of growths, you are going to get examples of asymmetry, what with genetic aberration, growth health, healed injures, etc. etc.

[andrewsaurus rex]

i don't think anyone is drawing firm conclusions, one way or the other.  The discovered specimen had asymmetrical frill horns.  From a sample size of one, it can't be concluded whether this was a trait of the species or an aberration.  Probably the latter, but nothing definite can be claimed either way at this point.

[thomasw100]

Really an interesting new genus with all ingredients for a beautiful figure to be made. It has good size (not too large but not too small), quite good remains (most of the skull and frill bones are there, also the horn cores, enough of the post-cranial skeleton to estimate the proportions), distinguishing horns, and already a good skeletal reconstruction.

[VD231991]

Lokiceratops shares its name with the species epithet lokii for the Medusaceratops type species, which honors the Norse mischief god Loki. As a matter of fact, Medusaceratops, which is recovered in a clade with Albertaceratops and Lokiceratops (named Albertaceratopsini by Mark Loewen and colleagues), was once considered the same animal as Albertaceratops by Michael Ryan before he eventually realized that the horned dinosaur material from the Mansfield Bonebed was morphologically distinct from the holotype of Albertaceratops nesmoi.

[Perotorum]

I wonder where xenoceratops fits into the relationship to the new clade of albertoceratopsini, as the paper did not include it in cladistic analysis, and it is of a similar location, horn configuration, and cladistic position to the novel clade.

[Funk]

Countdown to synomization with the other two extremely similar albertoceratopsins from the same formation... If the level of individual variation seen in other centrosaurines is anything to go by.

[Sim]

Countdown to synomization with the other two extremely similar albertoceratopsins from the same formation... If the level of individual variation seen in other centrosaurines is anything to go by.

It doesn't really look close enough to them to warrant syonymisation in my view.  They certainly look more different than Coronosaurus and Spinops do to Centrosaurus, and only Gregory Paul has synonymised them into Centrosaurus...  The Chasmosaurus specimens also all look more like each other than Lokiceratops does to the other albertoceratopsins and there are people who are seriously trying to spilt Chasmosaurus...

[Funk]

As someone pointed out, look at the variation in Styracosaurus alone: