Paleontology
Category archives for Paleontology
Mammals and the KT Event
Posted by Greg Laden on February 10, 2008 A very important and truly wonderful paper in Nature described a tour-de-force analysis of the Mammalian Evolutionary Record, and draws the following two important conclusions: The diversification of the major groups of mammals occurred millions of years prior to the KT boundary event; and The further diversification of these groups into the modern pattern of…
Are We In The Anthropocene? No.
Posted by Greg Laden on January 31, 2008 Proposals to give the latter part of the present geological period (the Holocene) a new name … the Anthropocene … are misguided, scientifically invalid, and obnoxious. However, there is a use for a term that is closely related to “Anthropocene” and I propose that we adopt that term instead.
Did Humans or Climate Change Cause the Extinctions of Pleistocene Eurasian Megafauna?
Posted by Greg Laden on January 25, 2008 Did humans wipe out the Pleistocene megafauna? This is a question that can be asked separately for each area of the world colonized by Homo sapiens. It is also a question that engenders sometimes heated debate. A new paper coming out in the Journal of Human Evolution concludes that many Pleistocene megafauna managed to…
After the End Permian Mass Extinction
Posted by Greg Laden on January 23, 2008 The end-Permian mass extinction event was the big daddy of all the known mass extinction events. Life on the planet Earth was almost entirely wiped out. A new paper explores the post-extinction recovery of ecological systems.
The Evolution of the Modern Climate: New Evidence from Plant Remains
Posted by Greg Laden on January 17, 2008 Things are just not like what they used to be. You know this. You know that the Age of Dinosaurs, for instance, was full of dinosaurs and stuff, and before transitional fossil forms crawled out of the sea to colonize the land, all animals were aquatic, etc. But did you know that from a purely…
The Island Effect in Dinosaurs
Posted by Greg Laden on January 11, 2008 Everyone these days knows about the “island effect” where certain animals evolve to a diminutive size because they live on islands. You know this because of the Flores hominid. Now, it has been shown to have operated in a dinosaur.
Cave Bears More Carnivorous Than Previously Thought
Posted by Greg Laden on January 8, 2008 From a University of Bristol Press Release: “Rather than being gentle giants, new research reveals that Pleistocene cave bears, a species which became extinct 20,000 years ago, ate both plants and animals and competed for food with the other contemporary large carnivores of the time such as hyaenas, lions, wolves, and our own human ancestors.”
Deep Sea Evidence of Major Volcanic Eruptions
Posted by Greg Laden on January 8, 2008 Pumice is rock that is ejected from a volcano, and has so much gas trapped in it that it can float. So when a pumice-ejecting volcano (not all volcanoes produce pumice) goes off near a body of water, you can get a raft of rock floating around for quite some time. By and by, water…
New Open Access Paleontology Journal
Posted by Greg Laden on January 4, 2008 Its name is, unfortunately, “Open Paleontology Journal.” Reminds me of the Soviet/Communist Era in Asia, where such a journal might have been named “The People’s Paleontology Journal.” Details are here.
Avalon and the origin of multicellular life
Posted by Greg Laden on January 3, 2008 New research published in Science on the origins of multicellular life reveals an interesting pattern. The Cambrian Explosion may have been samosamo.
The Bahamas Yield Amazing Fossil Finds
Posted by Greg Laden on December 21, 2007 Plant and animal fossils recently discovered from an island in the Bahamas tell a story of habitat change and human involvement in local extinction.
A Whale of a Missing Link : Indohyus
Posted by Greg Laden on December 19, 2007 Yet another missing link has been found! This new find links whales to quadrupedal land mammals. Thewissen et al. report in Nature new fossil material from the Middle Eocene of Kashmir, India. This species (in the genus Indohyus is represented by a remarkable set of remains, including cranial and post cranial material. Previous studies using…
Giant Skeleton Found
Posted by Greg Laden on December 15, 2007 OMG, look at this: … oh wait, it’s a fake. But an interesting fake. Read about it here, on Afarensis.
Royal Ontario Museum Unveils Huge Dinosaur
Posted by Greg Laden on December 13, 2007 From Dinosaurs and the Bible: If you’re living in or is near the Ontario area, go pay a visit to the Royal Ontario Museum to get a load of the unveiling of a huge dinosaur mount that was previously hidden in the museum storage and forgotten for 40 years until it was rediscovered last year…
New Glyptodont Species
Posted by Greg Laden on December 12, 2007 A team of U.S. and Chilean scientists working high in the Andes have discovered the fossilized remains of an extinct, tank-like mammal they conclude was a primitive relative of today’s armadillos. The results of their surprising new discovery are described in an upcoming issue of Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. The partial skeleton was unearthed by…
Student identifies enormous new dinosaur
Posted by Greg Laden on December 12, 2007 Fossils representing on of one of the largest meat-eating dinosaurs known, the African Carcharodontosaurus iguidensis, were identified by Steve Brusatte, a student working at the University of Bristol. The fossils were originally located in Niger. Carcharodontosaurus iguidensis, a new species, was about 13 to 14 meters long, with a skull about 1.75 meters long. It…
Dinosaurs
Posted by Greg Laden on December 8, 2007 With all the recent news about dinosaurs, I thought you’d like to see a video of actual dinosaurs:
Academic uncovers Holy Grail of palaeontology
Posted by Greg Laden on December 4, 2007 According to this press release from Manchester..
New, Really Big Sea-dwelling Dinosaur
Posted by Greg Laden on December 4, 2007 The small fragments of bone are spread out on a workbench in tiny pieces that could fit into a matchbox, betraying the size of their owner: a fearsome sea predator considered the Tyrannosaurus Rex of the oceans. … a pliosaur, a reptile that swam the oceans 150 million years ago and was so big it…
, which is now available for the 
