Technicians prepare a fossilized hadrosaur's ten-ton body block for examination in a large-scale CT scanner at a facility near Canoga Park, California. NASA and the Boeing Company provided access to the scanner, which was used for 25 years to image airplane and aerospace equipment.

So far the high-resolution scans, partially funded by the National Geographic Society, have revealed that the backside of the 67-million-year-old duck-billed dinosaur was 25 percent larger than previously thought.

A larger, more muscular rear end means that the animal had powerful legs, according to British paleontologist Phillip Manning, who is leading the examination.

"Our models confirm this hadrosaur would have had potential to run faster than T. rex," Manning said. Preliminary calculations suggest that the dino could run 28 miles (45 kilometers) an hour, while T. rex topped out at about 20 miles (32 kilometers) an hour.

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