Scientific publishing is entering a new era, with digital content becoming more and more important in a world where data is openly and freely shared. In palaeontology, we’re not being left behind. Along with this shift, 3D fossils are adding a new breadth to the field, both in a scientific and educational context. A great …[Read More]
Palaeontology
Was the diversity of feeding styles in giant turtles a key to their suckcess?
Sometimes, it can be difficult to figure out how ancient organisms used to eat. Part of the problem is that we can never actually see extinct animals eating (until we invent time-travel.. *taps fingers impatiently at physicists*), and often it can be hard to work out how something ate based just on its anatomy. Sometimes …[Read More]
A double-whammy of dinosaur awesomeness. Pun totally intended.
This is a post about pachycephalosaurs. It’s not a post about feathered dinosaurs, huge dinosaurs, or any of the ones which you may be more familiar with from popular media. Pachycephalosaurs were the dome-headed little scrappers of the Cretaceous, around 85 to 66 million years ago. Their name means ‘thick-skulled lizard’ (pachy: thick, cephalon: skull, …[Read More]
SVP Day 3
OK, day 3, still alive. The first session this morning was on saurischians dinosaurs, the major group that includes sauropods and theropods. My supervisor, Phil Mannion, was the first talk I was awake enough for (*cough*), and gave us a run-through of sauropods from the infamous Late Jurassic (~150 million years old) Tendaguru formation from …[Read More]
SVP Day 2
So again, I missed most of the morning, spending it in the UK Embassy getting an emergency passport. Unfortunately, this means most of the Romer Session, where early-career (thanks Phil for correction) students present for an award, was missed. Obviously, with the lack of Wi-Fi and live-tweeting, the session might as well have been conducted …[Read More]
SVP Day 1
So after definitely not losing my passport, I managed to make it into one of the sessions for the first day at SVP, the Society for Vertebrate Palaeontology’s annual meeting over in Los Angeles. The session was on the impacts of ontogeny, or growth and development on our understanding of dinosaur relationships and biology. The …[Read More]
Crocodiles are so hard, they even eat fruit
Seed dispersal by animals is incredibly important for plants to help them occupy new areas of land and reproduce. Usually, this happens using bugs, birds, or intrepid kittens, but probably the last animal on this planet you’d expect to disperse seeds is crocodiles – you know, those big beasties that take down bison for a …[Read More]
Good news everyone..!
Thanks to Ross Mounce for alerting me to this piece of news. Fossil Record: An International Journal of Geosciences We invite you to submit or recommend papers to this ISI-listed, international palaeontological journal of the Museum fur Naturkunde Berlin. Fossil Record publishes original research papers covering all areas of palaeontology and provides a platform for a …[Read More]
What do we know about the origin of flowering plants?
This is a guest post by Dan Peppe. He is an Assistant Professor in the Geology Department at Baylor University. His research interests are focused on reconstructing ancient climates and ecosystems in North America and East Africa and on developing new and improved palaeoclimate and palaeoecological proxies using methods in paleobotany, sedimentary geology, and paleomagnetism. More …[Read More]
Palaeontology rocks!
OK, so the usual joke is Geology rocks, but Catherine Bennett, who describes herself as a “Dinosaur-loving, bike-riding, dog-owning, tuna pasta eating pop star!!” created this cool video with the remixed title. It stars many palaeontologists I know from the UK, and is a really nice way of showcasing the diversity of palaeontologists and palaeontology …[Read More]