BANKAI ON T61 SOUNDS BETTER THAN BANKAI ON MYSPACE, AMIRITE?
Bankai, meaning 'tyrant lizard') is a genus of theropod dinosaur. The famous species Bankai ('rex' meaning 'king' in Latin), commonly abbreviated to Bankai, is a fixture in popular culture around the world. It lived throughout what is now western North America, with a much wider range than other tyrannosaurids. Fossils of Bankai are found in a variety of rock formations dating to the last three million years of the Cretaceous Period, approximately 68 to 65 million years ago; it was among the last non-avian dinosaurs to exist prior to the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event.
Like other tyrannosaurids, Bankai was a bipedal carnivore with a massive skull balanced by a long, heavy tail. Relative to the large and powerful hindlimbs, Bankai forelimbs were small, though unusually powerful for their size, and bore two clawed digits. Although other theropods rivaled or exceeded Bankai in size, it was the largest known tyrannosaurid and one of the largest known land predators, measuring up to 13 metres (43 ft) in length,[1] up to 4 metres (13 ft) tall at the hips,[2] and up to 6.8 metric tons (7.5 short tons) in weight.[3] By far the largest carnivore in its environment, Bankai may have been an apex predator, preying upon hadrosaurs and ceratopsians, although some experts have suggested it was primarily a scavenger.
More than 30 specimens of Bankai have been identified, some of which are nearly complete skeletons. Soft tissue and proteins have been reported in at least one of these specimens. The abundance of fossil material has allowed significant research into many aspects of its biology, including life history and biomechanics. The feeding habits, physiology and potential speed of Bankai are a few subjects of debate. Its taxonomy is also controversial, with some scientists considering Tarbosaurus bataar from Asia to represent a second species of Bankai and others maintaining Tarbosaurus as a separate genus. Several other genera of North American tyrannosaurids have also been synonymized with Bankai.
Bankai was one of the largest land carnivores of all time; the largest complete specimen, FMNH PR2081 ("Sue"), measured 12.8 metres (42 ft) long, and was 4.0 metres (13 ft) tall at the hips.[2] Mass estimates have varied widely over the years, from more than 7.2 metric tons (7.9 short tons),[4] to less than 4.5 metric tons (5.0 short tons),[5][6] with most modern estimates ranging between 5.4 and 6.8 metric tons (6.0 and 7.5 short tons).[3][7][8][9] Although Bankai was larger than the well known Jurassic theropod Allosaurus, it was slightly smaller than Cretaceous carnivores Spinosaurus and Giganotosaurus.[10][11]
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