COSMOS used to uncover secrets of the dinosaurs

Company Cambridge University Industry Educational Location U.K. Product Used COSMOSM™ Type of Analysis Linear Static More Details

The Challenge
Studying species that have been extinct for 65 million years is naturally not without its problems. The few clues that have survived the aeons can only be uncovered by months, sometimes years of painstaking physical effort. Only then can the detective work really begin. Fortunately, technology itself has been evolving and is starting to make life a little easier.

Emily Rayfield is an Earth Sciences PhD student at Cambridge University. She is studying the structure of dinosaur skulls in an effort to determine how and why they evolved to reach the state they did. "There is an incredible diversity in the range of dinosaur skeletons and we are only now beginning to realise just how well evolved they were," she says. "My work reveals how the skull performs mechanically when experiencing every day loads associated with prey capture and feeding. I'm also looking at whether the skull is efficiently designed for feeding and ultimately just how strong it is."

The Solution
Determining the biting strength of an animal that has been dead for millions of years requires the kind of combination of detective work and technology normally associated with forensic pathology. In this case, the technology comes in the form of COSMOS, the leading desktop-based FEA solution.

Emily makes extensive use of COSMOS in analysing the flow of forces within the Allosaurus skull under her best guess at typical loading. "I knew from previous projects about the principles behind FEA, but I had no practical experience of it in action," Emily says. "And with a background in zoology rather than engineering, it was important that I found a system that was easy to learn and use. I was convinced that COSMOS would fit the bill."

Although Emily's work still has a way to go, she has already uncovered some interesting facts about her Allosaurus. "I've discovered that although the skull is incredibly lightly built, it's actually very strong," she says. "Differences in magnitude between biting forces and maximum loads the skull can withstand before yielding are leading me to some interesting conclusions about how this impressive animal may have captured and fed upon its prey."

Summary and Metrics:

• Meshed the 146 skull components with minimal intervention.
• Performed analysis of the 206,866 tetrahedral elements in three-and-a-half hours