Updated on Tuesday, June 30, 2009, 09:51 IST

London, June 30: British scientists trying to solve the mystery behind eating habits of herbivorous dinosaurs have found that the species had a unique way of chewing their food unlike anything alive today.

The scientists at the University of Leicester, who studied the microscopic scratches on the teeth of hadrosaurs - herbivorous duck-billed dinosaurs - found that rather than having a flexible lower jaw joint, the creatures had a hinge between the upper jaws and the rest of the skull.

"The Hadrosaurs did chew, but in a completely different way to anything alive today. Rather than a flexible lower jaw joint, they had a hinge between the upper jaws and the rest of the skull," said Paul Barrett, a palaeontologist at the UK-based Natural History Museum.

"As they bit down on their food the upper jaws were forced outwards, flexing along this hinge so that the tooth surfaces slid sideways across each other, grinding and shredding food in the process," he said.

Palaeontologist Mark Purnell of the University of Leicester Department of Geology, who led the research, said, "Our study uses a new approach based on analysis of the microscopic scratches that formed on hadrosaur's teeth as they fed, tens of millions of years ago. The scratches have been preserved intact since the animals died."

Bureau Report