Kosmoceratops

Kosmoceratops (KOZ-mo-SARA-tops[1]) is a genus of ceratopsid dinosaur that lived in what is now Utah, United States, about 76.4–75.5 million years ago during the Late Cretaceous period. Specimens were discovered in the Kaiparowits Formation of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in 2006 and 2007, including an adult skull and postcranial skeleton and partial subadults (between juvenile and adult). In 2010, the adult was made the holotype of the new genus and species Kosmoceratops richardsoni; the generic name means "ornate horned face", and the specific name honors Scott Richardson, who found the specimens. The find was part of a spate of ceratopsian discoveries in the early 21st century, and Kosmoceratops was considered significant due to its elaborate skull ornamentation.

Kosmoceratops had an estimated length of 4.5 m (15 ft) and weight of 1.2 t (1.3 short tons). As a ceratopsid, it would have been quadrupedal with a heavily constructed skeleton. It had a triangular beak with a pointed tip, and a blade-like nasal horn with a flattened upper portion. While the horns above the eyes were oriented forwards or hindwards in most of its relatives, the horns of Kosmoceratops pointed up and to the sides, then downwards, ending in pointed tips. The neck frill was short from front to back, with small  parietal fenestrae  (openings through the frill), and ten hook-like processes on the hind margin, with eight curving forwards and two curving to the sides. With fifteen well-developed horns and horn-like structures, it possessed the most ornate skull in any known dinosaurs. Kosmoceratops was a chasmosaurine ceratopsid and was originally suggested to be closely related to Vagaceratops (which also had forward-curving processes on the back of the frill), but this has been debated, with some authors finding the latter closer to Chasmosaurus. Kosmoceratops is also considered closely related to Spiclypeus, which had a similar frill.

Studies of bone histology show that Kosmoceratops grew rapidly and had an elevated metabolism, similar to modern birds and mammals. The teeth of ceratopsids were adapted to processing fibrous plants; coprolites (fossilized dung) from the Kaiparowits Formation that contain wood may have been produced by ceratopsids. The functions of ceratopsian frills and horns have been debated, including display, combat, and species recognition. The Kaiparowits Formation dates to the late Campanian age and was deposited on Laramidia, an island continent, when North America was divided at the center by the Western Interior Seaway. This environment was dominated by wetlands and supported a diverse fauna, including dinosaurs such as the chasmosaurine Utahceratops. Based in part on the relationship between Kosmoceratops and other chasmosaurines from around the same time, it has been proposed that Laramidia was divided into dinosaur "provinces" with separate endemic zones (this interpretation suggests that Kosmoceratops in the south was most closely related to the geographically separated Vagaceratops in the north), but this has been contested.