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Morning News

Paleontologist Discusses Dinosaur Named After 'Dire Straits' Guitarist

Aired January 25, 2001 - 10:54 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, here's strange one for you, folks.

"Dire Straits" guitarist Mark Knopfler has received, perhaps, the strangest honor of his career. A newly discovered dinosaur has been named after him.

Paleontologists found the creature's bones on the island of Madagascar, off the coast of Africa.

Did you hear the "Dire Straits" coming on? We have plenty of it for you.

Researchers say they named the dinosaur after the rock star because they listened to a lot of "Dire Straits" music during the dig.

The 70-million-year-old dinosaur is about the size of a German shepherd, with unusual protruding teeth.

Joining us now by phone to talk more about the find and the name is paleontologist Scott Sampson.

Scott, good morning.

SCOTT SAMPSON, UNIVERSITY OF UTAH: Good morning. How are you doing?

KAGAN: I'm doing OK.

Tell us first about your find.

SAMPSON: All right.

KAGAN: Not the prettiest of dinosaurs that I've ever seen.

SAMPSON: No. But it's one of the most bizarre.

Your average dinosaur has the same teeth throughout the mouth, and this thing has different teeth, front and rear. And we think it maybe was using the front teeth for all kinds of nice things, like stabbing prey items, whether those things were insects or birds or mammals or fish. And then the teeth at the back are kind of a standard issue for a meat-eating dinosaur. And those things are probably used for slicing the victim up into pieces.

KAGAN: So in terms of a dinosaur discovery, how does this rate?

SAMPSON: Well, it's kind of an exciting one. I think one of the most important things to come out of it is that it shows that we really don't know, not only not everything about dinosaurs.

We hardly know anything about dinosaurs. We are still scratching the surface of what there is to be known. And there are still lots of dinosaurs being found on a regular break -- regular basis, that are brand new to science.

KAGAN: You know one thing I always wonder when we see these pictures of dinosaurs, like we are looking at a drawing of this one right now? How do you guys know what color they were?

SAMPSON: We have no idea. You can, like, put that thing with pink and purple polka-dots and I couldn't tell you, you are wrong. Birds are colorful, and birds and dinosaurs are closely related. So it's possible dinosaurs were colorful. But we really don't know.

KAGAN: OK, so that part's just a guess.

Now, let's get to the part where you have the connection between this great dinosaur find, a bunch of bones, and "Dire Straits" and Mark Knopfler. Is this just a matter of spending too much time in the Madagascar sun?

SAMPSON: Basically, that's exactly correct. Take 20 people, put them in the sun for six weeks in a remote area of Madagascar. And of course, you want to bring along a few comforts from home when we bring music. And that music, of course, included the music of "Dire Straits."

But that's not why we named it after Knopfler. The name comes from the fact that whenever we played the music of "Dire Straits" in the query, we tended to have more luck finding bones of this new little dinosaur. So Knopfler kind of became a talisman for us.

And as a paleontologist, it doesn't matter how good you are. You never know what you are going to get in the fields. You can strike it rich and make it the find of a lifetime, or you can strike out. So we'll basically take the luck anywhere we can get it.

KAGAN: And have you heard from Mark Knopfler?

SAMPSON: Yes, we have. He's responded and took it in the spirit that was intended, and basically told us that he's delighted, honored. He wants everybody to know that he thinks that it's apt that it's a dinosaur, but that he is not, in the least bit, vicious.

KAGAN: And doesn't have teeth like that.

And as we say good-bye, you are a braver person than I; pronounced it the full name of the dinosaur for us.

SAMPSON: Masiakasaurus knopfleri, the vicious lizard of Knopfler.

KAGAN: Beautiful. Scott Sampson, congratulations on the find. And thanks for explaining the Dire Strait story to us; really appreciate it.

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