This shows what the newly discovered long-necked dinosaur may have looked like. Credit: Xing Lida University of Alberta paleontologists including PhD student Tetsuto Miyashita, former MSc student Lida Xing and professor Philip Currie have discovered a new species of a long-necked dinosaur from a skeleton found in China. The findings have been published in a new paper in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 
 
 Qijianglong (pronounced "CHI-jyang-lon") is about 15 metres in length and lived about 160 million years ago in the Late Jurassic. The name means "dragon of Qijiang," for its discovery near Qijiang City, close to Chongqing. The fossil site was found by construction workers in 2006, and the digging eventually hit a series of large neck vertebrae stretched out in the ground. Incredibly, the head of the dinosaur was still attached. "It is rare to find a head and neck of a long-necked dinosaur together because the head is so small and easily detached after the animal dies," explains Miyashita. 
 
 The new species belongs to a group of dinosaurs called mamenchisaurids, known for their extremely long necks sometimes measuring up to half the length of their bodies. Most sauropods, or long-necked dinosaurs, have necks only about one third the length of their bodies. 
 
 Unique among mamenchisaurids, Qijianglong had neck vertebrae that were filled with air, making their necks relatively lightweight despite their enormous size. Interlocking joints between the vertebrae also indicate a surprisingly stiff neck that was much more mobile bending vertically than sideways, similar to a construction crane. 
 
 "Qijianglong is a cool animal. If you imagine a big animal that is half-neck, you can see that evolution can do quite extraordinary things." says Miyashita. 
 
 The reconstructed skeleton of the newly-discovered dinosaur in the gallery of Qijiang Museum, China. Credit: None needed 
 
 Mamenchisaurids are only found in Asia, but the discovery of Qijianglong reveals that there could be as many differences among mamenchisaurids as there are between long-necked dinosaurs from different continents. 
 
 "Qijianglong shows that long-necked dinosaurs diversified in unique ways in Asia during Jurassic times—something very special was going on in that continent," says Miyashita. "Nowhere else we can find dinosaurs with longer necks than those in China. The new dinosaur tells us that these extreme species thrived in isolation from the rest of the world." 
 
 Miyashita believes that mamenchisaurids evolved into many different forms when other long-necked dinosaurs went extinct in Asia. "It is still a mystery why mamenchisaurids did not migrate to other continents," he says. It is possible that the dinosaurs were once isolated as a result of a large barrier such as a sea, and lost in competition with invading species when the land connection was restored later. 
 
 The Qijianglong skeleton is now housed in a local museum in Qijiang. "China is home to the ancient myths of dragons," says Miyashita, "I wonder if the ancient Chinese stumbled upon a skeleton of a long-necked dinosaur like Qijianglong and pictured that mythical creature." 
 
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 What the newly discovered long-neck dinosaur may have looked like. (Xing Lida) 
 
 Of the many staggering statistics that depict China’s incredible building boom, perhaps the most striking came last month courtesy of Bill Gates. He tweeted a graphic that showed how much cement China has recently run through in its drive to cover a massive country in concrete. In the past three years, he said, it has used more cement than the United States has in the past 100 years. 
 
 “This might be the most mind-blowing fact I learned this year,” he said. This blitz has resulted in the loss of innumerable ancient treasures. But the boom, it turns out, has also yielded some as well. 
 
 In 2006, that’s exactly what happened when a construction team working in Qijiang District in central China spotted what a new paper published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology called some “elusive vertebrate fossils.” So the local municipality commissioned a wide survey of the area and uncovered an even more remarkable find: a freakishly long-necked “dragon” dinosaur. 
 
 Jackpot. 
 
 They called it Qijanglong, which means “dragon of Qijiang.” The size of the beast, which extended 45 feet in length and lived around 160 million years ago, got scientists wondering. “China is home to the ancient myths of dragons,” Tetsuto Miyashita, one of the authors on the study, said in a statement. “I wonder if the ancient Chinese stumbled upon a skeleton of a long-necked dinosaur like Qijanglong and pictured that mythical creature.” 
 
 Even more mythical was the fact that the dragon’s head was still attached to its bones — strange for a sauropod. “It is rare to find a head and neck of a long-necked dinosaur together because the head is so small and easily detached after the animal dies,” Miyashita said. 
 
 The beast turned out to be a new dinosaur species that, in a competition of long necks, has one of the longest. More than half of its body was just neck. It “is a cool animal,” Miyashita said. “If you imagine a big animal that is half the neck, you can see that evolution can do quite extraordinary things.” 
 
 The surprising thing about the neck was that, despite its size, it was relatively light. Like a bird, its vertebrae were filled with air. And its mechanics weren’t all that dissimilar to a construction crane — it could go up and down with relative ease, but side to side was another matter. 
 
 The discovery notched an important evolutionary chapter in the history of sauropods, scientists said, for it shows the sweeping diversification among those beasts in Asia that didn’t happen elsewhere. “Something very special was going on in that continent,” Miyashit said. “Nowhere else can we find dinosaurs with longer necks than those in China.” 
 
 And this had just about the longest one of them all.
– Scientists are seriously excited about a new long-necked dinosaur species found near China's Qijiang City. For one thing, fossils of the beast, which lived 160 million years ago in the Late Jurassic period, show a skull still attached to its neck—a rare find among dinosaurs like this as "the head is so small and easily detached after the animal dies," a researcher explains. For another, interlocking joints between the vertebrae suggest the dinosaur's neck moved vertically more than sideways, like a construction crane. Dubbed "dragon of Qijiang" or Qijianglong, the dinosaur belongs to the mamenchisaurids group, Phys.org reports. It stretched about 50 feet long, with its neck taking up half that length. University of Alberta paleontologists say Qijianglong was able to support its massive neck because its vertebrae were filled with air, like a bird's, making it relatively lightweight, the Washington Post reports. "Qijianglong shows that long-necked dinosaurs diversified in unique ways in Asia during Jurassic times—something very special was going on in that continent," says a co-author of the paper in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. He's even curious whether Qijianglong inspired the dragon myths of its homeland. "I wonder if the ancient Chinese stumbled upon a skeleton of a long-necked dinosaur like Qijianglong and pictured that mythical creature." (In contrast, scientists recently found a bunny-sized dinosaur.)