Tetrapod Zoology
With all the media circus surrounding Nigersaurus, not enough publicity was given to another cool sauropod described on Thursday - the Xenoposeidon. It is quite amazing what a few years of painstaking study, comparative anatomy and head-scratching can do - reconstruct a large dinosaur from a single remnant: half a vertebra. My SciBling Darren Naish, co-author on the paper, describes it in great detail. I've been waiting for it for about a year or so, since Darren first mentioned it on his old blog in a four-part post about "Angloposeidon". The other co-author, Mike Taylor, obviously adores the fossil bone!
The paper was published in the journal Palaeontology and the PDF of the article is freely available here. On the beautifully narrow-niche blog Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week, there are already four detailed posts about Xenoposeidon: one, two, three, four. Congratulations, Darren!
Stranger Fruit
My SciBling John Lynch was just awarded the CASE/Carnegie Professor of the Year award for Arizona. He got to go to D.C. and roam the hallways of Congress and then come back and tell us all about it. Congratulations, John!
Neurotopia
Evil Monkey is finally free! Congratulations, Evil!
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Wow - thanks for the kind words! I'll admit that Xenoposeidon isn't quite as impressive as Nigersaurus... but it could still beat it in a fight:) [reference]