The Washington Post: Dinosaur survivor debate lives on
And now, another episode of "Dinosaur Survivor."
In this show, the question isn't which dinosaur to throw off the island. Instead, scientists ask whether any of the ancient reptiles survived the cataclysmic strike of a space rock in the Gulf of Mexico some 65 million years ago.
Representing the no team: Pretty much every dinosaur hunter in the world.
Representing the yes team: A retired federal geologist from New Mexico, James Fassett.
For 25 years, Fassett has been touting a fossilized femur he found as proof that a pocket of long-necked herbivores called sauropods survived for hundreds of thousands of years after all the other dinosaurs.
"I'm not totally a Lone Ranger," Fassett said of his theory. "But I guess I am still in the minority."
In the latest installment of this long-running series, Fassett and two colleagues report in the journal Geology that a new technique dates the femur to 700,000 years after the extinction event.
But few experts are buying it. One of Fassett's critics offered a sarcastic response. "Anything is possible," said Spencer Lucas, a paleontologist at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science in Albuquerque. "There could also be a Bigfoot in my back yard."
With the new dating technique, Larry Heaman and Antonio Simonetti from the University of Alberta in Edmonton vaporized tiny bits of Fassett's fossil with a laser. They then measured the amount of uranium and lead in the resulting dust. Because uranium radioactively decays into lead over millions of years, the process acts as an atomic clock.
If proved, the laser technique could revolutionize fossil dating, said Paul Renne, director of the nonprofit Berkeley Geochronology Center in California. Currently, paleontologists date fossils indirectly, by determining the age of the rocks in which they're found or by hunting for specks of fossilized pollen nearby, which also offer strong age clues. In contrast, the laser blasting method attempts to date fossils directly.
However, Renne and several other fossil-dating experts said the technique is too new to be reliable. "Uranium-lead dating is tricky business," said Alan Koenig, a rock-dating expert with the U.S. Geological Survey in Denver.
A primary concern: It is impossible to know when, exactly, uranium leached into the bone. After the sauropod died in what is now northern New Mexico, the calcium in its bones was eventually replaced by harder, longer-lasting minerals, including uranium. That's the fossilization process. But paleontologists say there is no way to know how long this might take. "It could be 10 years; it could be a million," Renne said.
The laser method, then, provides some indication of when uranium entered the fossil. It does not pinpoint when the animal died. To further complicate matters, uranium may have leached into the fossil multiple times as, say, floods separated by millions of years washed over it.
Heaman said he tried to account for this by laser blasting only "pristine" areas of the fossil. For instance, he avoided sections near cracks, which might have allowed newer uranium to leach in.
The technique yielded an estimated age of 64.8 million years, give or take 900,000 years. That range straddles the so-called K/T boundary, the geological flash point that marks the end of the age of dinosaurs. Fassett said that other data he has collected and published prove that the fossil is younger than the K/T boundary. In particular, he said that fossilized pollen from the Ojo Alamo sandstone formation near the fossil could only have come from an era after the K/T boundary.
To prove it, about 10 years ago, Fassett took Lucas and another skeptical paleontologist, Robert Sullivan of the State Museum of Pennsylvania in Harrisburg, to the fossil site and pointed to where he sampled the pollen. The two paleontologists collected their own sample and tested it. But they obtained different results, concluding that the pollen was not, in fact, as young as Fassett had claimed. In 2009, Lucas and Sullivan published this and other evidence rebutting Fassett's theory.
Fassett's new paper fails to address the rebuttal. Lucas went so far as to call it "bad science." In the past 20 years, other prospects of survivor dinosaurs in Montana, South America and China have failed to hold up under scrutiny.
As for how the erstwhile survivors might have marched on, Fassett said, "All I can do is guess." One idea: Sauropods buried their eggs immediately before the asteroid impact; months later, the youngsters hatched into a devastated world to start a new herd. Or, perhaps some sauropods survived far from the blast - in Alaska, where sauropod fossils have been found - and later migrated south.
Whatever the case, expect more episodes of "Dinosaur Survivor."
Even Lucas called the search for survivors worthwhile. "The world is a big place, so why couldn't there be a refugium where a few dinosaurs limped on?" he said. "But you're going to need really strong evidence."
Monday, January 31, 2011
Newly Discovered Dinosaur Likely Father of Triceratops
ECN Daily: Newly Discovered Dinosaur Likely Father of Triceratops
New Haven, Conn. - Triceratops and Torosaurus have long been considered the kings of the horned dinosaurs. But a new discovery traces the giants' family tree further back in time, when a newly discovered species appears to have reigned long before its more well-known descendants, making it the earliest known member of its family.
The new species, called Titanoceratops after the Greek myth of the Titans, rivaled Triceratops in size, with an estimated weight of nearly 15,000 pounds and a massive eight-foot-long skull.
Titanoceratops , which lived in the American southwest during the late Cretaceous period around 74 million years ago, is the earliest known triceratopsin, suggesting the group evolved its large size more than five million years earlier than previously thought, according to Nicholas Longrich, the paleontologist at Yale who made the discovery. The finding, which will appear in an upcoming issue of the journal Cretaceous Research, helps shed light on the poorly understood origins of these giant horned dinosaurs.
Longrich was searching through scientific papers when he came across a description of a partial skeleton of a dinosaur discovered in New Mexico in 1941. The skeleton went untouched until 1995, when it was finally prepared and identified incorrectly as Pentaceratops , a species common to the area. When the missing part of its frill - the signature feature of the horned dinosaurs - was reconstructed for display in the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, it was modeled after Pentaceratops .
"When I looked at the skeleton more closely, I realized it was just too different from the other known Pentaceratops to be a member of the species," Longrich said, adding that the specimen's size indicated that it likely weighed about twice as much as adult Pentaceratops . The new species is very similar to Triceratops , but with a thinner frill, longer nose and slightly bigger horns, Longrich said.
Instead, Longrich believes that Titanoceratops is the ancestor of both Triceratops and Torosaurus , and that the latter two split several millions years after Titanoceratops evolved. "This skeleton is exactly what you would expect their ancestor to look like," he said.
Titanoceratops was probably only around for about a million years, according to Longrich, while the triceratopsian family existed for a total of about 10 million years and roamed beyond the American southwest into other parts of the country and as far north as Canada.
In order to confirm the discovery beyond any trace of a doubt, Longrich hopes paleontologists will find other fossil skeletons that include intact frills, which would help confirm the differences between Titanoceratops and Pentaceratops .
"There have got to be more of them out there," Longrich said.
New Haven, Conn. - Triceratops and Torosaurus have long been considered the kings of the horned dinosaurs. But a new discovery traces the giants' family tree further back in time, when a newly discovered species appears to have reigned long before its more well-known descendants, making it the earliest known member of its family.
The new species, called Titanoceratops after the Greek myth of the Titans, rivaled Triceratops in size, with an estimated weight of nearly 15,000 pounds and a massive eight-foot-long skull.
Titanoceratops , which lived in the American southwest during the late Cretaceous period around 74 million years ago, is the earliest known triceratopsin, suggesting the group evolved its large size more than five million years earlier than previously thought, according to Nicholas Longrich, the paleontologist at Yale who made the discovery. The finding, which will appear in an upcoming issue of the journal Cretaceous Research, helps shed light on the poorly understood origins of these giant horned dinosaurs.
Longrich was searching through scientific papers when he came across a description of a partial skeleton of a dinosaur discovered in New Mexico in 1941. The skeleton went untouched until 1995, when it was finally prepared and identified incorrectly as Pentaceratops , a species common to the area. When the missing part of its frill - the signature feature of the horned dinosaurs - was reconstructed for display in the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, it was modeled after Pentaceratops .
"When I looked at the skeleton more closely, I realized it was just too different from the other known Pentaceratops to be a member of the species," Longrich said, adding that the specimen's size indicated that it likely weighed about twice as much as adult Pentaceratops . The new species is very similar to Triceratops , but with a thinner frill, longer nose and slightly bigger horns, Longrich said.
Instead, Longrich believes that Titanoceratops is the ancestor of both Triceratops and Torosaurus , and that the latter two split several millions years after Titanoceratops evolved. "This skeleton is exactly what you would expect their ancestor to look like," he said.
Titanoceratops was probably only around for about a million years, according to Longrich, while the triceratopsian family existed for a total of about 10 million years and roamed beyond the American southwest into other parts of the country and as far north as Canada.
In order to confirm the discovery beyond any trace of a doubt, Longrich hopes paleontologists will find other fossil skeletons that include intact frills, which would help confirm the differences between Titanoceratops and Pentaceratops .
"There have got to be more of them out there," Longrich said.
Study Shows Dinosaurs Lived 700,000 Years After Mass Extinction
Daily Tech: Study Shows Dinosaurs Lived 700,000 Years After Mass Extinction
New dinosaur bone found in New Mexico suggests the hadrosaur lived beyond mass extinction
A fossilized dinosaur bone discovered in New Mexico contradicts previous scientific data that suggests that dinosaur extinction occurred between 65.5 and 66 million years ago, says a team of researchers from the University of Alberta.
Larry Heaman, study leader from the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Alberta, along with a team of researchers from the university, have found a fossilized femur bone of a hadrosaur in New Mexico that is only 64.8 million years old, showing that dinosaurs lived 700,000 years beyond mass extinction in the late Cretaceous period.
Paleontologists believe that dinosaurs became extinct between 65.5 and 66 million years ago when debris from a large meteorite impact blocked the sun, changing the climate drastically and killing vegetation. Paleontologists determined this time period as the age of extinction by using a traditional technique called relative chronology, which has been used in this field of science to estimate the age of fossils. Relative chronology is when a fossil's age is determined by the depositional age of a layer of sediment where the fossil was found, or by the depositional age of layers of sediment above and below the fossil. But the problem with this method is that environmental and geologic forces can cause fossils to shift or migrate from their original layers of sediment, leading to a potentially inaccurate estimate of age.
For this particular study, Heaman and the University of Alberta team checked the age of the recently discovered dinosaur bone using a technique called U-Pb (uranium-lead) dating. This method uses a laser beam to "unseat" tiny particles of the fossil. These particles are then subjected to isotopic analysis, which both determines age and the type of food the dinosaur ate.
The U-Pb dating method is accurate because living bone carries low levels of uranium, but fossilized bone is rich with uranium. These uranium atoms decay into lead over time, and determining the isotopic composition of the lead in fossilized bones leads to its absolute age.
After using this technique on the femur bone of the hadrosaur, Heaman and his team concluded that the bone is 64.8 million years old, which means that this hadrosaur came from a line of dinosaurs that survived the great mass extinction in the late Cretaceous period, and lived 700,000 years beyond it. Researchers believe these particular plant-eaters were able to survive mass extinction because some of the vegetation may have survived the climate change allowing them to eat.
Now the researchers are looking to figure out if dinosaur eggs could have potentially survived during the period of mass extinction, which would further explain the survival of these dinosaurs. They also plan to use the U-Pb dating method to continue measuring the absolute age of other dinosaur fossils. Heaman believes that this technique will replace relative chronology, and will be used to rewrite the history of the extinction of the dinosaurs.
This study, titled "Direct U-Pb dating of Cretaceous and Paleocene dinosaur bones, San Juan Basin, New Mexico," was published in Geology.
New dinosaur bone found in New Mexico suggests the hadrosaur lived beyond mass extinction
A fossilized dinosaur bone discovered in New Mexico contradicts previous scientific data that suggests that dinosaur extinction occurred between 65.5 and 66 million years ago, says a team of researchers from the University of Alberta.
Larry Heaman, study leader from the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Alberta, along with a team of researchers from the university, have found a fossilized femur bone of a hadrosaur in New Mexico that is only 64.8 million years old, showing that dinosaurs lived 700,000 years beyond mass extinction in the late Cretaceous period.
Paleontologists believe that dinosaurs became extinct between 65.5 and 66 million years ago when debris from a large meteorite impact blocked the sun, changing the climate drastically and killing vegetation. Paleontologists determined this time period as the age of extinction by using a traditional technique called relative chronology, which has been used in this field of science to estimate the age of fossils. Relative chronology is when a fossil's age is determined by the depositional age of a layer of sediment where the fossil was found, or by the depositional age of layers of sediment above and below the fossil. But the problem with this method is that environmental and geologic forces can cause fossils to shift or migrate from their original layers of sediment, leading to a potentially inaccurate estimate of age.
For this particular study, Heaman and the University of Alberta team checked the age of the recently discovered dinosaur bone using a technique called U-Pb (uranium-lead) dating. This method uses a laser beam to "unseat" tiny particles of the fossil. These particles are then subjected to isotopic analysis, which both determines age and the type of food the dinosaur ate.
The U-Pb dating method is accurate because living bone carries low levels of uranium, but fossilized bone is rich with uranium. These uranium atoms decay into lead over time, and determining the isotopic composition of the lead in fossilized bones leads to its absolute age.
After using this technique on the femur bone of the hadrosaur, Heaman and his team concluded that the bone is 64.8 million years old, which means that this hadrosaur came from a line of dinosaurs that survived the great mass extinction in the late Cretaceous period, and lived 700,000 years beyond it. Researchers believe these particular plant-eaters were able to survive mass extinction because some of the vegetation may have survived the climate change allowing them to eat.
Now the researchers are looking to figure out if dinosaur eggs could have potentially survived during the period of mass extinction, which would further explain the survival of these dinosaurs. They also plan to use the U-Pb dating method to continue measuring the absolute age of other dinosaur fossils. Heaman believes that this technique will replace relative chronology, and will be used to rewrite the history of the extinction of the dinosaurs.
This study, titled "Direct U-Pb dating of Cretaceous and Paleocene dinosaur bones, San Juan Basin, New Mexico," was published in Geology.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Terrible Lizard, by Deborah Cadbury
Terrible Lizard: The First Dinosaur Hunters and the Birth of a New Science, by Deborah Cadbury
Henry Holt and Company, 2000 (first published in Great Britain as The Dinosaur Hunters)
326 pages plus a few b&w photos scattered throughout book, Notes and Sources, Select biblioraphy and index
Description
In 1812 a twelve-year-old girl named Mary Anning was collecting fossils for her father beneath the cliffs of Dorset when she discovered the outline of a lizardlike skeleton embedded in the limestone. Working with a small hammer, she unearthed a giant prehistoric animal seventeen feet in length.
News of her descovery baffled scholars and attracted the attention of the REverend William Buckland, an eccentric Oxford naturalist known for his interest in geology or "undergroundology" as he called it. Buckland eagerly used Mary's find and other remnant fossils to set in motion a quest to understand the world before Noah's flood, though his inquiry was in fact an attempt to prove the accuracy of the biblical record (the scriptures alone were the key to understanding history in his view, and fossils were interpreted in this context.)
Meanwhile, another naturalist, Gideon Mantell, a poor country doctor, uncovered giant petrified bones in a Sussex quarry and became obsessed with the ancient past that, he came to realize, must once have been teeming with creatures up to seventy feet long. Initially scorned by thes cientific establishment, Mantell risked his reputation and career to reveal his vision of the lost world of reptiles.
Despite their efforts, it was the eminent anatomist Richard Owen, patronized by royalty, the prime minister, and the aristocracy, who claimed the credit for the discovery of the dinosaurs. Through guile, political intrigue, and brilliant scientific insight, Owen rose from surgeon's apprentice in Lancaster to the highest echelons of society and was feted as the man who gave the extinct creatures their name, dinosaur or "terrible lizard."
Deborahh Cadbury's lively story re-creates the bitter food between Mantell and Owen, which drove one of them to despair and ruin and secured for the other unrivaled international acclaim. Their struggle brought to light the age of dinosaurs and created a new science that would forever change man's perception of his place in the universe.
Table of Contents
Picture Credits
Acknowledgments
Part 1
1. An ocean turned to stone
2. The World in a pebble
3. Toast of mice and crocodiles for tea
4. The Subterranean forest
5. The Giant Saurians
Part 2
6. The young contender
7. Satan's Creatures
8. The GEological Age of reptiles
9. Nature, red in tooth and claw
10. Nil Desperandum
Part 3
11. Dinosauria
12. The Arch-hater
13. Dinomania
14. Nature without God?
Epilogue
Notes and sources
Select bibliography
Index
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Single-fingered dinosaur surprises scientists
The Washington Post: Single-fingered dinosaur surprises scientists
Would your parents ever let you keep a dinosaur as a pet, especially one related to the fierce Tyrannosaurus rex?
What if you told your folks that it could keep pests such as ants and termites out of the house?
Scientists in China have discovered the bones of a dinosaur that kids who promised to clean their room and make honor roll might have been able to bring home. The species was as small as eight inches tall and weighed less than a pound.
The most fascinating discovery concerning Linhenykus monodactylus is that unlike the T. rex, it had one finger instead of three.
Scientists expected that as dinosaurs used their middle finger for digging, it would have gotten bigger, leading to the eventual disappearance of the two side digits. However, this dinosaur's single finger was smaller than the middle digit of three-fingered species. "We don't see this very often in dinosaur evolution," said researcher Xu Xing.
The big problem with the dinosaur-as-a-pet notion? Linhenykus monodactylus died out about 80 million years ago.
Would your parents ever let you keep a dinosaur as a pet, especially one related to the fierce Tyrannosaurus rex?
What if you told your folks that it could keep pests such as ants and termites out of the house?
Scientists in China have discovered the bones of a dinosaur that kids who promised to clean their room and make honor roll might have been able to bring home. The species was as small as eight inches tall and weighed less than a pound.
The most fascinating discovery concerning Linhenykus monodactylus is that unlike the T. rex, it had one finger instead of three.
Scientists expected that as dinosaurs used their middle finger for digging, it would have gotten bigger, leading to the eventual disappearance of the two side digits. However, this dinosaur's single finger was smaller than the middle digit of three-fingered species. "We don't see this very often in dinosaur evolution," said researcher Xu Xing.
The big problem with the dinosaur-as-a-pet notion? Linhenykus monodactylus died out about 80 million years ago.
Monday, January 24, 2011
A Triceratops Hunt in Pioneer Wyoming, by Barnum Brown
A Triceratops Hunt in Pioneer Wyoming: The Journals of Barnum Brown and JP Sams. University of Kansas Expedition of 1895, by Barnum Brown andJ.P. Sams, edited by Michael F. Kohl, Larry D. Martin and Paul Brinkman
High Plains Press, 2004
128 pages, plus 1895 milestones, endnotes, bibliography and index
Description
Professor Samuel Williston led a group of rugged young dinosaur hunters from the University of Kansas to barely-settled Wyoming. They were searching for Triceratops, the three-horned dinosaur, still new to science.
Professor Williston, at the prime of an illustrious career in paleontology, had a nnew new museum at the university he wanted to fill with bones and fossils. A Triceratops would make a perfect addition.
This expedition was a turning point for two of the young students-Barnum Brown and Elmer Riggs-who would go on to eminent bone hunting careers of their own. As Riggs later wrote, they chose "to follow the lure of paleontology [while] lying awake...among the sagebrush of Wyoming...enjoying the coolness of a desert night, and looking up into the starry canopy above."
Wyoming, still "a tough cowboy place", only five yeares a state, was just beginning as well. The Kansas Expedition, accustomed to more civilized surroundings, marveled at Hartville, "composed of one shack, a combination of post office and whiskey saloon"; Wheatland, "a small osis in the desert...being boomed by eastern capitalists"; Badger where a home/store/post office was "about the size of a Kansas henhouse"; and Lusk, where the minister was a woman whose husband was serving time in the penitentiary.
Here young Barnum Brown and University Regent James P Sams record in two seperate journals the colorful details of the expedition. Editors Michael Kohl, Larry D Martin, and Paul Brinkman have put the diaries in context with expansive footnotes.
Table of Contents
Introduction by Paul Brinkman, Larry D. Martin and Michael F. Kohl
Barnum Brown Journal:
Kansas State Geological Expedition, 1895
J.P. SAm's Journal:
Fossil Huntin in Wyoming
Maps:
Routes of the 1895 Kansas Expedition
Southeast Wyoming, 1892
Wyoming Sites of the 1895 Kansas Expedition
Milestones, 1895
Endnotes
Bibliography
Index
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
Friday, January 21, 2011
Current News: Rare T-rexes are centerpiece of 'major dinosaur experience' at Los Angeles museum
MercuryNews.com: Rare T-rexes are centerpiece of 'major dinosaur experience' at Los Angeles museum
The toddler howls. The preteen growls. And the toothsome teen may be the next roaring bad boy of Los Angeles.
The Tyrannosaurus rex trio unveiled Wednesday at the Natural History Museum contains the youngest, the rarest and the hungriest-looking specimens in the world, paleontologists said.
As the centerpiece of a new Dinosaur Hall, they are set to go on display in July.
"The T-rexes are back!" said Luis Chiappe, director of the Dinosaur Institute at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, as a curtain opened to reveal the skeletons of a baby, a juvenile and a young adult.
"There's movement. There's tension, screaming. I think the whole exhibit is very L.A. -- very hip. It's everything you want to be in this town."
The new Dinosaur Hall will feature more than 300 fossils, 20 complete dinosaurs and interactive exhibits galore.
Visitors will see iconic dinosaurs that lived and became extinct at different times, including the Triassic Coelophysis, the Jurassic Stegosaurus and the Mesozoic Tyrannosaurus rex.The exhibit, spanning the museum's 1913 and 1920 buildings, will also feature a never-before displayed Triceratops and a 68-foot Mamenchisaurus.
Twice the size of the museum's old dinosaur digs at 1,400 square feet, the new hall is part of a $135 million museum makeover
leading up to its 2013 centennial.
"The exhibition will emerge as one of the major dinosaur experiences in the world,"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Advertisement
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
said Jane Pisano, president and director of the Exposition Park museum.
"Its specimens and science will easily position the museum as the West Coast hub for dinosaurs."
It was more than four decades ago that museum paleontologists unearthed a rare 20-foot T-rex juvenile and an 11-foot baby T-rex in the badlands of Montana, then stored them in the museum basement.
The 2-year-old T-rex from 66 million years ago, never before exhibited, is considered the youngest known specimen on the planet.
A few years ago, Chiappe and his team returned to Montana and discovered Thomas, a 34-foot male that ranks as among the most complete T-rexes ever found.
He lived large, apparently, before dying at the rebellious young age of 18.
"He was the James Dean of dinosaurs," said Doyle Trankina, a museum Dinosaur Institute sculptor who helped on the Montana dig, as well as fashioned the missing bones for baby Rex.
The three carnivores were sent to New Jersey, where their 210 respective bones were framed for a unique "growth series" display. It took five full-time workers a year and a half to prepare their skeletons for Los Angeles.
The result, now being assembled, is a dynamic dinosaur dinner drama.
The 21-foot-tall, 7,200-pound Thomas looms over the T-rex baby as they confront the snarling juvenile, who rears back to defend a duck-billed Edmontosaurus carcass.
The question, unanswered by the exhibit, is whether T-rexes hunted in roving packs or scavenged their reptile carrion.
"It's unique to Los Angeles," said Phil Fraley, of Phil Fraley Productions, one of North America's finest fossil articulators, whose company mounted Thomas as well as Sue, whose record 43-foot frame looms in Chicago.
"There's a relationship between all these skeletons not seen anywhere in the world."
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
The toddler howls. The preteen growls. And the toothsome teen may be the next roaring bad boy of Los Angeles.
The Tyrannosaurus rex trio unveiled Wednesday at the Natural History Museum contains the youngest, the rarest and the hungriest-looking specimens in the world, paleontologists said.
As the centerpiece of a new Dinosaur Hall, they are set to go on display in July.
"The T-rexes are back!" said Luis Chiappe, director of the Dinosaur Institute at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, as a curtain opened to reveal the skeletons of a baby, a juvenile and a young adult.
"There's movement. There's tension, screaming. I think the whole exhibit is very L.A. -- very hip. It's everything you want to be in this town."
The new Dinosaur Hall will feature more than 300 fossils, 20 complete dinosaurs and interactive exhibits galore.
Visitors will see iconic dinosaurs that lived and became extinct at different times, including the Triassic Coelophysis, the Jurassic Stegosaurus and the Mesozoic Tyrannosaurus rex.The exhibit, spanning the museum's 1913 and 1920 buildings, will also feature a never-before displayed Triceratops and a 68-foot Mamenchisaurus.
Twice the size of the museum's old dinosaur digs at 1,400 square feet, the new hall is part of a $135 million museum makeover
leading up to its 2013 centennial.
"The exhibition will emerge as one of the major dinosaur experiences in the world,"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Advertisement
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
said Jane Pisano, president and director of the Exposition Park museum.
"Its specimens and science will easily position the museum as the West Coast hub for dinosaurs."
It was more than four decades ago that museum paleontologists unearthed a rare 20-foot T-rex juvenile and an 11-foot baby T-rex in the badlands of Montana, then stored them in the museum basement.
The 2-year-old T-rex from 66 million years ago, never before exhibited, is considered the youngest known specimen on the planet.
A few years ago, Chiappe and his team returned to Montana and discovered Thomas, a 34-foot male that ranks as among the most complete T-rexes ever found.
He lived large, apparently, before dying at the rebellious young age of 18.
"He was the James Dean of dinosaurs," said Doyle Trankina, a museum Dinosaur Institute sculptor who helped on the Montana dig, as well as fashioned the missing bones for baby Rex.
The three carnivores were sent to New Jersey, where their 210 respective bones were framed for a unique "growth series" display. It took five full-time workers a year and a half to prepare their skeletons for Los Angeles.
The result, now being assembled, is a dynamic dinosaur dinner drama.
The 21-foot-tall, 7,200-pound Thomas looms over the T-rex baby as they confront the snarling juvenile, who rears back to defend a duck-billed Edmontosaurus carcass.
The question, unanswered by the exhibit, is whether T-rexes hunted in roving packs or scavenged their reptile carrion.
"It's unique to Los Angeles," said Phil Fraley, of Phil Fraley Productions, one of North America's finest fossil articulators, whose company mounted Thomas as well as Sue, whose record 43-foot frame looms in Chicago.
"There's a relationship between all these skeletons not seen anywhere in the world."
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
Thursday, January 20, 2011
The Bone Museum, by Wayne Grady
The Bone Museum: Travels in the Lost World of Dinosaurs and Birds, by Wayne Grady
Four Walls Eight Windows/Penguin Group, 2000
284 pages plus index, no photos
Library: 569.9 GRA
Description
The theory that dinosaurs have evolved into birds has sent science writer Wayne Grady on a globe-trotting fossil hunt with brush and pick in hand. In The Bone Museum, Grady follows vertebrate paleontologist Phil Currie, one of the world's leading proponents of the bird-dinosaur connection, on a journey in search of answers to the question: is there life after extinction?
In 1996 a group farmers happened upon several unusual fossils in an ancient lake bed in northeastern China. The fossilsappeared to be those of dnosaurs, but bore an extraordinary feature: a thin aura of fibers, very much resembling feathers, outlining the skeleton. It is for this skeleton and in the name of what it suggests that Currie heads to China in hopes of tracing the evolutionary link between birds and dinosaurs. Their trek takes GRady from China to Paragonia, and back to North America; exploring numerous sites on three continents, Grady and Currie dig and sift, literally piecing together clues that might answer the question: Did dinosaurs evolve into birds?
Paleontology provided strong evidence to support Darwin's theory that human beings are descended from apes-might it also support Currie's theory of transition and adaptation in a species thought to be long gone? Success in Currie's hunt would be to discover the most compelling evidence to suggest that there is life after extinction.
Living in tents and experiencing the drudgery of fieldwork as well as the thrill of doscovery, Grady recounts his journeys with great detail, clarity, and a storyteller's sense of narrative. Through frustrations, blisters, blinding wind storms, rain and mud, to the ultimate glimpse of bone, his tales offer a compelling blend of adventurous travel and intellectual quest.
[Darwin did not say man was descended from apes, surely, but rather than apes and man had descended from the same source.]
Table of contents
Part 1: Flight Paths
Phil Currie's Christmas Turkey
Lost Worlds
Part 2: Patagonia
To the Rio Negro
Theropod Heaven
Desert RainOverburden
Beyond the Dusty Universe
The Living Screen
Part 3: The Badlands
The Call of the WAkon Bird
A Day at the Bone Museum
Dry Island
The Fossil Song
Ghost Birds
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
Sunday, January 16, 2011
The Bone Hunters, by Url Lanham
The Bone Hunters: The Heroic Age of Paleontology in the American West, by Url Lanham
Dover Publications, 1991 )unabridged, slightly corrected edition of book published in 1973 by Columbia University Press.
271 pages, Bibliography, index, b&w photos scattered throughout book
Library: 560.978 LAN 1991
Description
A century after the founding of the Republic, the United States was a leader in the science of vertebrate paleontology-the study of the fossils of backboned animals. In this lucid, nontechnical study, a noted popularizer of science and former curator at the Museum of the University of Colorado first reviews the geology of the western United States and provides an overview of American paleontology since the days of Thomas Jefferson.
Dr. Lanham focuses on the paleontologists themselves and the outstanding fossil discoveries that revolutionaized our understanding of vertebrate evolution. You'll learn how 19th century paleontologists struggled against hostile Indians, scorching summers and frigid winters, loneliness, isolation, lack of funds and other hardships as they excavated tons of fossil bones from beds and quarries in South Dakota, Kansas, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, and other areas. While many eminent scientists are profiled, including SAmuel Williston, John Bell Hatchers, Ferdinand Vandiveer Hayden and Joseph Leidy, much of the book is devoted to the explorations and achievements of Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward drinker Cope. These two brilliant paleontoligists, whose discoveries revolutionized the discipline, eventual became bitter rivals and the central figures in one of the most notorious scientific feuds of the century.
These and many other aspects of 19th century paleontology are covered in this fascinating and readable book. Easily accessible for the layman, The Bone Hunters will appeal to any reader interested in the behind-the-scenes drama and inspired scientific fieldwork that resulted in an explosion of knowledge about the nature and evolution of the prehistoric animals that once roamed the American West.
Table of Contents
Introduction
1. Scientist in the White House
2. Rocks and Fossils
3. Joseph Leidy
4. The Big Badlands
5. The Bone Hunters Come to the Sioux Country
6. Othniel Charles Marsh
7. Edward Drinker Cope
8. The Smoky Hill
9. Big Bone Chief
10. In Quest of the Great Sea Serpents
11. Bridger Basin
12. West of the Jemez
13. Marsh as Partisan
14. The Beautiful Judith
15. Super-Dinosaurs
16. "Dawn Horses" and Birds with Teeth
17. Prince of Collectors: John Bell Hatcher
18. The Triumverate: Hayden, Powell and King
19. Cope as Financier
20. Revenge
21. After the Battle
Bibliography
Index
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
Dover Publications, 1991 )unabridged, slightly corrected edition of book published in 1973 by Columbia University Press.
271 pages, Bibliography, index, b&w photos scattered throughout book
Library: 560.978 LAN 1991
Description
A century after the founding of the Republic, the United States was a leader in the science of vertebrate paleontology-the study of the fossils of backboned animals. In this lucid, nontechnical study, a noted popularizer of science and former curator at the Museum of the University of Colorado first reviews the geology of the western United States and provides an overview of American paleontology since the days of Thomas Jefferson.
Dr. Lanham focuses on the paleontologists themselves and the outstanding fossil discoveries that revolutionaized our understanding of vertebrate evolution. You'll learn how 19th century paleontologists struggled against hostile Indians, scorching summers and frigid winters, loneliness, isolation, lack of funds and other hardships as they excavated tons of fossil bones from beds and quarries in South Dakota, Kansas, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, and other areas. While many eminent scientists are profiled, including SAmuel Williston, John Bell Hatchers, Ferdinand Vandiveer Hayden and Joseph Leidy, much of the book is devoted to the explorations and achievements of Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward drinker Cope. These two brilliant paleontoligists, whose discoveries revolutionized the discipline, eventual became bitter rivals and the central figures in one of the most notorious scientific feuds of the century.
These and many other aspects of 19th century paleontology are covered in this fascinating and readable book. Easily accessible for the layman, The Bone Hunters will appeal to any reader interested in the behind-the-scenes drama and inspired scientific fieldwork that resulted in an explosion of knowledge about the nature and evolution of the prehistoric animals that once roamed the American West.
Table of Contents
Introduction
1. Scientist in the White House
2. Rocks and Fossils
3. Joseph Leidy
4. The Big Badlands
5. The Bone Hunters Come to the Sioux Country
6. Othniel Charles Marsh
7. Edward Drinker Cope
8. The Smoky Hill
9. Big Bone Chief
10. In Quest of the Great Sea Serpents
11. Bridger Basin
12. West of the Jemez
13. Marsh as Partisan
14. The Beautiful Judith
15. Super-Dinosaurs
16. "Dawn Horses" and Birds with Teeth
17. Prince of Collectors: John Bell Hatcher
18. The Triumverate: Hayden, Powell and King
19. Cope as Financier
20. Revenge
21. After the Battle
Bibliography
Index
______________
This blog is updated every Monday and Thursday with books, and at other times if news occurs
16 Jan, 2011, Sun, Dinosaur News: Dinosaur Wars on American Experience
Dinosaur Wars on American Experience
A review by K. Kris Hirst, Kris's Archaeology Blog
On Monday, January 17th, 2011, PBS's American Experience presents "Dinosaur Wars", a fascinating tale of irrational greed and murderous jealousy over fossils and academic fame.
In the mid-19th century, the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species brought about a huge upswell of public interest in science. For a brief period of time, if you were white, male and monied, you too could be a paleontologist: there simply were no or very few educational programs for the budding science. Public interest and nothing short of fossil fever led to the immense growth of scientific research. By the late 19th century, American government spending on science outspent any other country in the world. Hard to believe, isn't it?
That spending came down with a crash, when Congress slashed the US Geological Survey's gargantuan budget after a scandal, which grew out of personal invective and bitter rivalry between two of paleontology's pioneers. The self-taught amateur Edward Drinker Cope and Yale University academic Othniel Charles Marsh were brilliant men, who together were responsible for the collections of tens of thousands of fossils, and for the exploration of Jurassic fossil beds at Como Bluff in Wyoming among many other sites. Marsh had the force of personality required to establish the U.S. Geological Survey; Cope had an uncanny ability to imagine what a collection of bones might represent.
Their rivalry took the two men off into the deep end of the pool, and both eventually ruined their careers and their lives. They spied on one another, sabotaged one another's research, wrote competing papers about the same fossil species, and generally wasted a great deal of time and fortune despising one another. "Dinosaur Wars" is a painful reminder that the history of science is littered with egos the size of hadrosaurs.
PBS's "Dinosaur Wars" tells this fascinating story using vintage photographs, video from paleontological sites and commentary from paleontologists Robert Bakker, Jacques Gautier, Tim Rowe and Peter Dodson, historian Steven Conn and the author of the Gilded Dinosaur Mark Jaffe. Produced by Mark Davis, Anna Saraceno and Mark Samels, Dinosaur Wars airs on Monday night, January 17th, and it is an hour well spent.
A review by K. Kris Hirst, Kris's Archaeology Blog
On Monday, January 17th, 2011, PBS's American Experience presents "Dinosaur Wars", a fascinating tale of irrational greed and murderous jealousy over fossils and academic fame.
In the mid-19th century, the publication of Darwin's On the Origin of Species brought about a huge upswell of public interest in science. For a brief period of time, if you were white, male and monied, you too could be a paleontologist: there simply were no or very few educational programs for the budding science. Public interest and nothing short of fossil fever led to the immense growth of scientific research. By the late 19th century, American government spending on science outspent any other country in the world. Hard to believe, isn't it?
That spending came down with a crash, when Congress slashed the US Geological Survey's gargantuan budget after a scandal, which grew out of personal invective and bitter rivalry between two of paleontology's pioneers. The self-taught amateur Edward Drinker Cope and Yale University academic Othniel Charles Marsh were brilliant men, who together were responsible for the collections of tens of thousands of fossils, and for the exploration of Jurassic fossil beds at Como Bluff in Wyoming among many other sites. Marsh had the force of personality required to establish the U.S. Geological Survey; Cope had an uncanny ability to imagine what a collection of bones might represent.
Their rivalry took the two men off into the deep end of the pool, and both eventually ruined their careers and their lives. They spied on one another, sabotaged one another's research, wrote competing papers about the same fossil species, and generally wasted a great deal of time and fortune despising one another. "Dinosaur Wars" is a painful reminder that the history of science is littered with egos the size of hadrosaurs.
PBS's "Dinosaur Wars" tells this fascinating story using vintage photographs, video from paleontological sites and commentary from paleontologists Robert Bakker, Jacques Gautier, Tim Rowe and Peter Dodson, historian Steven Conn and the author of the Gilded Dinosaur Mark Jaffe. Produced by Mark Davis, Anna Saraceno and Mark Samels, Dinosaur Wars airs on Monday night, January 17th, and it is an hour well spent.
14 Jan 2011, Dinosaur News: Argentine dinosaur paved way for T. rex: scientists
Reuters: Argentine dinosaur paved way for T. rex: scientists
Reuters) - A small predator that hunted in South America 230 million years ago represents one of the earliest-known dinosaurs and foreshadowed later meat-eating beasts like Tyrannosaurus rex, according to scientists from Argentina and the United States.
In findings published on Friday in the journal Science, they described the discovery of a dinosaur called Eodromaeus, meaning "dawn runner."
It was a modest creature -- measuring about 4 feet long and weighing only 10 to 15 pounds (4.5 to 6.8 kg) -- that walked on two legs and possessed a long neck and tail, sharp claws and saber-shaped teeth.
But the scientists said it paved the way for some true monsters like T. rex. Tyrannosaurus, which lived at the very end of the age of dinosaurs 65 million years ago, approached 50 feet in length and weighed about 6 tonnes.
The scientists found the fossilized remains of Eodromaeus in Argentina's "Valley of the Moon," a region that has provided a glimpse into some of the earliest days of the dinosaurs during the Triassic period.
"The dawn of the age of dinosaurs is coming into focus," Argentine paleontologist Ricardo Martinez, one of the scientists, said in a statement.
Eodromaeus was very close to the root of the dinosaur family tree, but already boasted features typical of the later meat-eating dinosaurs.
"It really is the earliest look we have at the long line of meat eaters that would ultimately culminate in Tyrannosaurus rex near the end of the dinosaur era," University of Chicago paleontologist Paul Sereno, who also took part in the study, said in a statement.
"Who could foretell what evolution had in store for the descendants of this pint-sized, fleet-footed predator?" Sereno added.
Two near-complete skeletons were found side-by-side in 1996 in a desert area in western Argentina, but scientists had to study the fossils thoroughly to determine that they belonged to a previously unknown dinosaur.
The scientists said Eodromaeus lived alongside another very early dinosaur called Eoraptor, a similar-sized creature that ate plants whose descendants eventually would include giant, long-necked sauropod dinosaurs like Apatosaurus and the truly gargantuan Argentinosaurus.
Eodromaeus, with its stabbing canine teeth and sharp-clawed grasping hands, was a precursor to the dinosaur meat-eaters called theropods, like T. rex, Allosaurus and Giganotosaurus, as well as to birds, the scientists said.
While dinosaurs eventually became the dominant land animals on Earth, these earliest ones were certainly not the masters of their universe. There were many larger reptiles living alongside them that would have easily turned them into a meal.
"We're looking at a snapshot of early dinosaur life. Their storied evolutionary careers are just unfolding, but at this point they're actually quite similar," Sereno said.
Reuters) - A small predator that hunted in South America 230 million years ago represents one of the earliest-known dinosaurs and foreshadowed later meat-eating beasts like Tyrannosaurus rex, according to scientists from Argentina and the United States.
In findings published on Friday in the journal Science, they described the discovery of a dinosaur called Eodromaeus, meaning "dawn runner."
It was a modest creature -- measuring about 4 feet long and weighing only 10 to 15 pounds (4.5 to 6.8 kg) -- that walked on two legs and possessed a long neck and tail, sharp claws and saber-shaped teeth.
But the scientists said it paved the way for some true monsters like T. rex. Tyrannosaurus, which lived at the very end of the age of dinosaurs 65 million years ago, approached 50 feet in length and weighed about 6 tonnes.
The scientists found the fossilized remains of Eodromaeus in Argentina's "Valley of the Moon," a region that has provided a glimpse into some of the earliest days of the dinosaurs during the Triassic period.
"The dawn of the age of dinosaurs is coming into focus," Argentine paleontologist Ricardo Martinez, one of the scientists, said in a statement.
Eodromaeus was very close to the root of the dinosaur family tree, but already boasted features typical of the later meat-eating dinosaurs.
"It really is the earliest look we have at the long line of meat eaters that would ultimately culminate in Tyrannosaurus rex near the end of the dinosaur era," University of Chicago paleontologist Paul Sereno, who also took part in the study, said in a statement.
"Who could foretell what evolution had in store for the descendants of this pint-sized, fleet-footed predator?" Sereno added.
Two near-complete skeletons were found side-by-side in 1996 in a desert area in western Argentina, but scientists had to study the fossils thoroughly to determine that they belonged to a previously unknown dinosaur.
The scientists said Eodromaeus lived alongside another very early dinosaur called Eoraptor, a similar-sized creature that ate plants whose descendants eventually would include giant, long-necked sauropod dinosaurs like Apatosaurus and the truly gargantuan Argentinosaurus.
Eodromaeus, with its stabbing canine teeth and sharp-clawed grasping hands, was a precursor to the dinosaur meat-eaters called theropods, like T. rex, Allosaurus and Giganotosaurus, as well as to birds, the scientists said.
While dinosaurs eventually became the dominant land animals on Earth, these earliest ones were certainly not the masters of their universe. There were many larger reptiles living alongside them that would have easily turned them into a meal.
"We're looking at a snapshot of early dinosaur life. Their storied evolutionary careers are just unfolding, but at this point they're actually quite similar," Sereno said.
Fossil museum begins big project with 'Building Triceratops' exhibit
Tricities.com: Fossil museum begins big project with 'Building Triceratops' exhibit
JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. – Employees and volunteers at the East Tennessee State University and General Shale Brick Natural History Museum and Visitor Center at the Gray Fossil Site will be building its upcoming exhibit – a life-size skeleton cast of a triceratops – from the ground up.
The fossil pieces have arrived, and beginning Jan. 15 visitors will be able to see portions of the constructed skeleton. Completion of the exhibit will take several weeks.
The museum staff describes this project as the ultimate jigsaw puzzle.
“When the majority of our previous exhibits were unveiled, they were completed, but this new one, called ‘Building Triceratops,’ is a work in progress and gives visitors a behind-the-scenes-look at what it takes to make an exhibit come together,” said Jessica Evans, the museum’s exhibits manager. “And, of course, seeing this life-size fossil will be amazing for people of all ages.”
The skull of the Triceratops horridus already has been on display at the museum as part of a partnership with the North Dakota Geological Survey, which is loaning the fossils to ETSU.Once the skeleton is mounted and has been on display at the Gray museum, it will be sent back to North Dakota.
Evans said the museum has been consulting with the paleobiology department at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, where the mount of a triceratops was recently reconstructed. Both the Smithsonian and the Shenandoah Valley Discovery Museum have loaned objects to be used in the “Building Triceratops” exhibition.
Also featured in the Niswonger Exhibit Hall will be “Dinosaur Art of Mark Musy.” This exhibition is a representation of an artist’s journey “from ideal to final creation,” featuring Musy’s hand-sculpted dinosaur models, as well as drawings and images of T-Rex, triceratops and other well-known dinosaurs. Evans said visitors will enjoy the detail and realism presented in the images.
For the first time, the museum will offer a two-for-one deal special from Jan. 15-March 31. All visitors who purchase admission to see the “Building Triceratops” exhibit during those dates will receive a free voucher to see the completed exhibit any time between April 1–May 15. In addition, educational programs for children pre-kindergarten through sixth grade will be offered on Saturdays throughout the duration of the exhibit. Detailed information on these classes is available at the museum’s online calendar.
“Building Triceratops” featuring “Dinosaur Art of Mark Musy” is sponsored locally by Dex. The ETSU and General Shale Brick Natural History Museum is open daily, including weekends, from 8:30 a.m.–5 p.m. For more information, call (866) 202-6223 or visit www.grayfossilmuseum.com.
JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. – Employees and volunteers at the East Tennessee State University and General Shale Brick Natural History Museum and Visitor Center at the Gray Fossil Site will be building its upcoming exhibit – a life-size skeleton cast of a triceratops – from the ground up.
The fossil pieces have arrived, and beginning Jan. 15 visitors will be able to see portions of the constructed skeleton. Completion of the exhibit will take several weeks.
The museum staff describes this project as the ultimate jigsaw puzzle.
“When the majority of our previous exhibits were unveiled, they were completed, but this new one, called ‘Building Triceratops,’ is a work in progress and gives visitors a behind-the-scenes-look at what it takes to make an exhibit come together,” said Jessica Evans, the museum’s exhibits manager. “And, of course, seeing this life-size fossil will be amazing for people of all ages.”
The skull of the Triceratops horridus already has been on display at the museum as part of a partnership with the North Dakota Geological Survey, which is loaning the fossils to ETSU.Once the skeleton is mounted and has been on display at the Gray museum, it will be sent back to North Dakota.
Evans said the museum has been consulting with the paleobiology department at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, where the mount of a triceratops was recently reconstructed. Both the Smithsonian and the Shenandoah Valley Discovery Museum have loaned objects to be used in the “Building Triceratops” exhibition.
Also featured in the Niswonger Exhibit Hall will be “Dinosaur Art of Mark Musy.” This exhibition is a representation of an artist’s journey “from ideal to final creation,” featuring Musy’s hand-sculpted dinosaur models, as well as drawings and images of T-Rex, triceratops and other well-known dinosaurs. Evans said visitors will enjoy the detail and realism presented in the images.
For the first time, the museum will offer a two-for-one deal special from Jan. 15-March 31. All visitors who purchase admission to see the “Building Triceratops” exhibit during those dates will receive a free voucher to see the completed exhibit any time between April 1–May 15. In addition, educational programs for children pre-kindergarten through sixth grade will be offered on Saturdays throughout the duration of the exhibit. Detailed information on these classes is available at the museum’s online calendar.
“Building Triceratops” featuring “Dinosaur Art of Mark Musy” is sponsored locally by Dex. The ETSU and General Shale Brick Natural History Museum is open daily, including weekends, from 8:30 a.m.–5 p.m. For more information, call (866) 202-6223 or visit www.grayfossilmuseum.com.
'Dawn Runner' Fossil Sheds Light On Early Dinosaurs
Red Orbit: 
'Dawn Runner' Fossil Sheds Light On Early Dinosaurs
Posted on: Friday, 14 January 2011
Scientists have unveiled fossils of one of the earliest dinosaurs ever discovered -- a petite, nimble carnivore from the late Triassic period some 230 million years ago.
Dubbed Eodromaeus, or "dawn runner", the never-before seen species was a small, two-legged creature that may have been among the first dinosaurs to roam the Earth, making them likely ancestors of the famous Tyrannosaurus rex.
The scientists reconstructed the dinosaur from a nearly complete set of bones found in Ischigualasto, a well-explored rock formation in northwestern Argentina. Many of the fossils were covered in iron encrustations, and required meticulous work under the microscope before casts could be constructed and a complete skeleton rebuilt.
Scientists say they discovered two near-complete dinosaur fossils adjacent to each other, something that helped shed light on the development of predatory dinosaurs known as theropods, which include the T. Rex.
“It really is the earliest look we have at the long line of meat eaters that would ultimately culminate in Tyrannosaurus rex near the end of the dinosaur era,” said Paul Sereno, a paleontologist at the University of Chicago and a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence.
“Who could foretell what evolution had in store for the descendants of this pint-sized, fleet-footed predator?” he added
Fossils of small theropods are extremely rare. This one is approximately six feet long, and had a long neck and tail, sharp claws and biting canine teeth. The scientists believe it weighed around 10 to 15 pounds.
After examining its limbs, the scientists believe they have identified differences between the "dawn runner" and its contemporary, the Eoraptor, which they now believe belonged to the large, long-necked and four-legged sauropod lineage.
Both species were roughly the same size and ran on two legs, the scientists said. This suggests that the three main types of dinosaur -- ornithischians, sauropodomorphs, and theropods -- that lived during the late Triassic period had similar body types.
However, the newly discovered Eodromaeus’ skull resembled those of other theropods, while the plant-eating Eoraptor "had more sauropod-like features, including enlarged nostrils and an inset first lower tooth," wrote the scientists in a report about the study.
An examination of the complete fossil record from the area revealed that early dinosaurs "were more common and diverse than previously thought," the researchers said.
After recording thousands of fossils in the area, scientists believe that dinosaurs came to dominate the landscape slowly over the course of millions of years.
"Dinosaurs took their sweet time to dominate the scene," said Ricardo Martinez of Argentina's National University of San Juan, who led the current study.
"The story from this valley suggests that there was no single advantage or lucky break for dinosaurs but rather a long period of evolutionary experimentation in the shadow of other groups," said Sereno.
The study was published Thursday in the journal Science.
'Dawn Runner' Fossil Sheds Light On Early Dinosaurs
Posted on: Friday, 14 January 2011
Scientists have unveiled fossils of one of the earliest dinosaurs ever discovered -- a petite, nimble carnivore from the late Triassic period some 230 million years ago.
Dubbed Eodromaeus, or "dawn runner", the never-before seen species was a small, two-legged creature that may have been among the first dinosaurs to roam the Earth, making them likely ancestors of the famous Tyrannosaurus rex.
The scientists reconstructed the dinosaur from a nearly complete set of bones found in Ischigualasto, a well-explored rock formation in northwestern Argentina. Many of the fossils were covered in iron encrustations, and required meticulous work under the microscope before casts could be constructed and a complete skeleton rebuilt.
Scientists say they discovered two near-complete dinosaur fossils adjacent to each other, something that helped shed light on the development of predatory dinosaurs known as theropods, which include the T. Rex.
“It really is the earliest look we have at the long line of meat eaters that would ultimately culminate in Tyrannosaurus rex near the end of the dinosaur era,” said Paul Sereno, a paleontologist at the University of Chicago and a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence.
“Who could foretell what evolution had in store for the descendants of this pint-sized, fleet-footed predator?” he added
Fossils of small theropods are extremely rare. This one is approximately six feet long, and had a long neck and tail, sharp claws and biting canine teeth. The scientists believe it weighed around 10 to 15 pounds.
After examining its limbs, the scientists believe they have identified differences between the "dawn runner" and its contemporary, the Eoraptor, which they now believe belonged to the large, long-necked and four-legged sauropod lineage.
Both species were roughly the same size and ran on two legs, the scientists said. This suggests that the three main types of dinosaur -- ornithischians, sauropodomorphs, and theropods -- that lived during the late Triassic period had similar body types.
However, the newly discovered Eodromaeus’ skull resembled those of other theropods, while the plant-eating Eoraptor "had more sauropod-like features, including enlarged nostrils and an inset first lower tooth," wrote the scientists in a report about the study.
An examination of the complete fossil record from the area revealed that early dinosaurs "were more common and diverse than previously thought," the researchers said.
After recording thousands of fossils in the area, scientists believe that dinosaurs came to dominate the landscape slowly over the course of millions of years.
"Dinosaurs took their sweet time to dominate the scene," said Ricardo Martinez of Argentina's National University of San Juan, who led the current study.
"The story from this valley suggests that there was no single advantage or lucky break for dinosaurs but rather a long period of evolutionary experimentation in the shadow of other groups," said Sereno.
The study was published Thursday in the journal Science.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
12 Jan 2010, Wed, Dinosaur Discovery News: Gwawinapterus Beardi: New Pterosaur Genus Discovered From Jawbone Found In Cabinet
Huffington Post: Gwawinapterus Beardi: New Pterosaur Genus Discovered From Jawbone Found In Cabinet
Sometimes it pays to snoop around. When researcher Victoria Arbour opened a storage cabinet at the University of Alberta, she discovered a jawbone sitting in a dark corner.
The fossil had been found inside a rock on B.C.'s Hornby Island five years ago. It had then been placed in storage at the University's paleontology department, its origin a mystery.
Arbour was baffled, and initially thought the jawbone may have belonged to a dinosaur. And yet the teeth, Arbour explains, "reminded me of piranha teeth, designed for pecking away at meat," according to CTV News. Finally, after months of investigation, Arbour identified the bone as belonging to a pterosaur.
Pterosaurs are giant flying reptiles that lived until the Cretaceous period, about 65 million years ago. Although often confused for dinosaurs, pterosaurs are not dinosaurs. In fact, DiscoveryNews reports that one pterosaur may have even eaten dinosaurs.
As for Arbour's pterosaur, her particular reptile has smaller teeth than others, and thus it is believed that Arbour has discovered a new genus, which she has named Gwawinapterus beardi. It is believed that this pterosaur had a wingspan of about ten feet, while other pterosaurs can have wingspans of over 30 feet. Arbour states that the pterosaur was a scavenger, and probably patrolled the skies with its wide wingspan.
This is the first pterosaur ever found in B.C., although back in the Cretaceous period, the coastal islands were actually part of what is now California. Perhaps sometimes, it's not bad to have a skeleton in your closet. Or at least a jawbone.
Arbour's study was published in the Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences.
Sometimes it pays to snoop around. When researcher Victoria Arbour opened a storage cabinet at the University of Alberta, she discovered a jawbone sitting in a dark corner.
The fossil had been found inside a rock on B.C.'s Hornby Island five years ago. It had then been placed in storage at the University's paleontology department, its origin a mystery.
Arbour was baffled, and initially thought the jawbone may have belonged to a dinosaur. And yet the teeth, Arbour explains, "reminded me of piranha teeth, designed for pecking away at meat," according to CTV News. Finally, after months of investigation, Arbour identified the bone as belonging to a pterosaur.
Pterosaurs are giant flying reptiles that lived until the Cretaceous period, about 65 million years ago. Although often confused for dinosaurs, pterosaurs are not dinosaurs. In fact, DiscoveryNews reports that one pterosaur may have even eaten dinosaurs.
As for Arbour's pterosaur, her particular reptile has smaller teeth than others, and thus it is believed that Arbour has discovered a new genus, which she has named Gwawinapterus beardi. It is believed that this pterosaur had a wingspan of about ten feet, while other pterosaurs can have wingspans of over 30 feet. Arbour states that the pterosaur was a scavenger, and probably patrolled the skies with its wide wingspan.
This is the first pterosaur ever found in B.C., although back in the Cretaceous period, the coastal islands were actually part of what is now California. Perhaps sometimes, it's not bad to have a skeleton in your closet. Or at least a jawbone.
Arbour's study was published in the Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences.
Dinosaurs Today: ‘Terra Nova’ Promises Big Dinosaurs, But Not In a Lame Way
From Screen Junkies: ‘Terra Nova’ Promises Big Dinosaurs, But Not In a Lame Way
Fox premiered the first clips of their upcoming dinosaur time travel series “Terra Nova” at the Television Critics Association winter press tour. Images of people in the future wearing gas masks on the subway gave way to a lush tropical environment 85 million years ago. Paradise is short lived though, because thumping noises start to boom and characters get jerked out of frame.
The show, produced by Steven Spielberg, is about a family from the future who go back to the time of dinosaurs to start a new life for humanity. And dinosaurs eat them while they’re on the toilet, we hope. Alex Graves, director of the pilot, promised big thrills for the whole family.
“It’s not a scary show,” Graves said. “It’s an adventure show. My kids, I have young kids, they’ve already seen some of it and they loved it. They’re not scared. It’s not scary in that way. It’s adventure scary, not scary scary. What we know about the Cretaceous period is a lot of nice things. It was a lush period, the beginning of flowers. It really goes into the types of dinosaurs in the fossil record, and the gray area of the fossil records of where were dinosaurs in evolution and were they evolving into birds.”
Series producer Brannon Braga, of “24” and “Star Trek” fame, teased some of the dinos he’s flat out making up. “We have dinosaurs we know existed from the fossil record but you get to make up your own dinosaurs as well,” Braga said.
“Terra Nova” will get a spring premiere, then return for the full series. It worked for “Glee,” although they came back in the fall and “Terra” is not due until 2012. The premiere is a full two hour event though.
“It always kind of was 2 hours,” Graves said. “The story was. The whole dilemma, I think it started as an hour script like most pilots and yet you just read it and it never felt like an hour.”
Braga added, “We had too much story and we struggled for a long time to figure out how to fit it all into 60 pages. There was a meeting at the network where we were all looking at each other going what are we going to do? Let’s make it a 2 hour. Then it started to breathe and there were challenges of making it 2 hours.”
The Terra Nova community was first set up by scientists who discovered the portal to another time. The show will answer the time travel questions, but you shouldn’t worry too much about the science.
“That stuff’s all there,” Braga said. “It’s not really what it’s all about. It was an accidental discovery they capitalized on. We found this naturally occurring thing that goes back 85 million years. We don’t know why but let’s build a thing around it.”
Now that they’ve established the community of Terra Nova in the past, they’re populating it with doctors, craftsmen and regular families. The enclosure that is Terra Nova itself looks environmentally friendly, a frontier style wall with some future technology like solar panels. This ain’t Avatar though. It’s not all environmentalist.
“It’s not what the show’s about,” Braga said. “It is about a second chance for earth but earth can only be saved if people restore it themselves and not bring with it the baggage they leave behind. That’s the philosophical crux of the show. Can utopia be built? Is it possible?”
Look for the preview of “Terra Nova” this May.
Fox premiered the first clips of their upcoming dinosaur time travel series “Terra Nova” at the Television Critics Association winter press tour. Images of people in the future wearing gas masks on the subway gave way to a lush tropical environment 85 million years ago. Paradise is short lived though, because thumping noises start to boom and characters get jerked out of frame.
The show, produced by Steven Spielberg, is about a family from the future who go back to the time of dinosaurs to start a new life for humanity. And dinosaurs eat them while they’re on the toilet, we hope. Alex Graves, director of the pilot, promised big thrills for the whole family.
“It’s not a scary show,” Graves said. “It’s an adventure show. My kids, I have young kids, they’ve already seen some of it and they loved it. They’re not scared. It’s not scary in that way. It’s adventure scary, not scary scary. What we know about the Cretaceous period is a lot of nice things. It was a lush period, the beginning of flowers. It really goes into the types of dinosaurs in the fossil record, and the gray area of the fossil records of where were dinosaurs in evolution and were they evolving into birds.”
Series producer Brannon Braga, of “24” and “Star Trek” fame, teased some of the dinos he’s flat out making up. “We have dinosaurs we know existed from the fossil record but you get to make up your own dinosaurs as well,” Braga said.
“Terra Nova” will get a spring premiere, then return for the full series. It worked for “Glee,” although they came back in the fall and “Terra” is not due until 2012. The premiere is a full two hour event though.
“It always kind of was 2 hours,” Graves said. “The story was. The whole dilemma, I think it started as an hour script like most pilots and yet you just read it and it never felt like an hour.”
Braga added, “We had too much story and we struggled for a long time to figure out how to fit it all into 60 pages. There was a meeting at the network where we were all looking at each other going what are we going to do? Let’s make it a 2 hour. Then it started to breathe and there were challenges of making it 2 hours.”
The Terra Nova community was first set up by scientists who discovered the portal to another time. The show will answer the time travel questions, but you shouldn’t worry too much about the science.
“That stuff’s all there,” Braga said. “It’s not really what it’s all about. It was an accidental discovery they capitalized on. We found this naturally occurring thing that goes back 85 million years. We don’t know why but let’s build a thing around it.”
Now that they’ve established the community of Terra Nova in the past, they’re populating it with doctors, craftsmen and regular families. The enclosure that is Terra Nova itself looks environmentally friendly, a frontier style wall with some future technology like solar panels. This ain’t Avatar though. It’s not all environmentalist.
“It’s not what the show’s about,” Braga said. “It is about a second chance for earth but earth can only be saved if people restore it themselves and not bring with it the baggage they leave behind. That’s the philosophical crux of the show. Can utopia be built? Is it possible?”
Look for the preview of “Terra Nova” this May.
Monday, January 10, 2011
10 Jan 2011, Mon, Dinosaur Discovery News: B.C.'s 1st pterosaur fossil identified
CBC News: B.C.'s 1st pterosaur fossil identified
A new species of prehistoric flying reptile has been identified from a fossil found on B.C.'s Hornby Island.
The pterosaur Gwawinapterus beardi likely soared through tropical forests inhabited by dinosaurs — its evolutionary cousins — during the late Cretaceous period about 70 million years ago, reported University of Alberta paleontologist Victoria Arbour.
Her findings appear in the January issue of the Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences.
During the late Cretaceous period, Hornby Island was located in the area where California is today and was lusher and steamier.
The new species is the first pterosaur ever found in B.C., the second species of pterosaur ever found in Canada and the first "uniquely Canadian" species, said Arbour, a Ph.D. student who is originally from Halifax, N.S.
'Raven's wing'
The first half of the pterosaur's scientific name derives partly from the word "Gwa'wina" which means raven in the Kwak'wala language of the Kwakwaka'wakw First Nations and partly from the Greek word "pteron," which means wing. The Kwakwaka'wakw people are indigenous to Hornby Island, neighbouring islands and Vancouver Island.
The reptile was identified from a fossil jawbone discovered by Graham Beard, a well-known fossil collector who runs the Vancouver Island Paleontological Museum in Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island. Arbour named the species after him.
Fossil hunting isn't as easy in B.C. as it is in the Alberta, where entire dinosaur fossils are dug up in the badlands of Dinosaur National Park, Arbour noted.
In B.C., fossil hunters comb the beaches along the Pacific coast.
"They basically pick up rocks, and they crack them open, and sometimes, they have fossils inside," Arbour said.
Beard found what he thought to be a dinosaur bone inside a rock on the beach of Hornby Island, one of the Gulf Islands off the east coast of Vancouver Island.
Victoria Arbour, shown here with the tail club of an armoured dinosaur, compared the teeth on a jawbone found on Hornby Island to those of dinosaurs, fish, marine reptiles, birds and other pterosaurs before figuring out what it was. (Courtesy of Victoria Arbour/University of Alberta)He passed it on to Arbour's supervisor, Philip Currie, a dinosaur expert. He, in turn, gave Arbour the task of identifying it. Currie later co-authored the paper describing the pterosaur.
Arbour examined the fossil's distinctive, arrow-like teeth attached to the jawbone and compared them to the teeth of various dinosaurs, marine reptiles, lizards, fish and birds.
At first, she didn't consider pterosaurs because known pterosaurs during the late Cretaceous didn't have teeth but a friend encouraged her to explore the possibility.
Finally, Arbour found a paper showing teeth that looked very similar to the ones she had been examining. They belonged to a Chinese pterosaur from the early Cretaceous.
'Piranha teeth'
Arbour drew this image of Gwawinapterus beardi in the style of the local First Nations of Hornby Island based on the characteristics of similar pterosaurs species. (Victoria Arbour/University of Alberta)The distinctive features of the teeth ruled out possibilities other than pterosaurs.
"The teeth look a little bit like piranha teeth the way that they're packed really close together," Arbour said.
They sit at the end of a long snout, so Arbour thinks the pterosaur may have been good at "sticking its nose in [and] nibbling the food off" bones that had already been picked over by other animals. It may also have hunted prey such as small dinosaurs, lizards or fish.
Based on the jaw alone, she thinks the pterosaur may have had a wingspan of three metres. However, other bones would be needed for a better estimate.
Arbour hopes the discovery of other pterosaur bones in B.C. will be more likely now that fossil hunters are aware that pterosaurs lived in the area.
"If people keep their eyes open while they're out looking on those beaches, you never know what you might find," she said.
Friday, January 7, 2011
6 Jan 2010: Prehistoric News: Ammonites' Last Meal
Underwater Times: Ammonites' Last Meal: New Light On Past Marine Food Chains; 'the Bigger Mouth Facilitates Feeding On Smaller Prey'
GRENOBLE, France -- Scientists have discovered direct evidence of the diet of one of the most important group of ammonites, distant relatives of squids, octopuses and cuttlefishes. The discovery may bring a new insight on why they became extinct 65.5 million years ago, at the end of the Cretaceous.
Ammonites are among the world's most well known fossils but until now, there has been no experimental evidence of their place in the food chain. Using synchrotron X-rays, a Franco-American team of scientists led by Isabelle Kruta has discovered exceptionally preserved mouth organs of ammonites, along with the remains of a meal that show that these ammonites dined on plankton. Plankton was largely destroyed in the wake of the same asteroid impact that led to the demise of the dinosaurs and other species. After losing their source of food, ammonites and many other marine groups could not survive this cataclysmic event. The findings are published this week in Science.
Ammonites are extinct relatives of the squid and octopus. The Nautilus, a present-day marine invertebrate, is similar in appearance to many ammonites but is a more distant relative. Ammonites appeared about 400 million years ago (the Early Devonian) and experienced a population explosion in the early Jurassic. In fact, ammonites became such an abundant and diverse part of the marine fauna that they are used by paleontologists as classic "index" fossils to determine the relative ages of marine Mesozoic rocks in which they are found.
The team of researchers, led by Isabelle Kruta (MNHN, CNRS, UPMC), used the ESRF to perform X-ray scans of exceptional quality of Baculites fossils found on AMNH expeditions to the Great Plains in the United States. Results suggests that the large group of ammonites to which Baculites belongs, had jaws and radula (a kind of tongue covered with teeth) adapted for eating small prey floating in the water.
The study used synchrotron X-ray microtomography to check the presence, and then digitally reconstruct the mouths of three fossils found in South Dakota. The three-dimensional reconstructions are of such high quality that the jaws and teeth are revealed in their complete form. In addition, one specimen has a tiny snail and three tiny crustaceans in its mouth, one of them having been cut into two parts. Because these planktonic fossils are not found anywhere else on the specimen, the team thinks that the specimen died while eating its last meal rather than being scavenged by these organisms after death.
"I was astonished when I saw the teeth for the first time, and when I found the tiny plankton in the mouth," Isabelle Kruta (MNHN). "For the first time we were able to observe the delicacy of these exceptionally well preserved structures and use high quality details to obtain information on the ecology of these enigmatic animals."
"When you take into consideration the large lower jaws of ammonites in combination with this new information about their teeth, you realize that these animals must have been feeding in a different way from modern carrion-eating Nautilus," says Neil Landman (AMNH). "Ammonites have a surprisingly large lower jaw with slender teeth, but the effect is opposite to that of the wolf threatening to eat Little Red Riding Hood. Here, the bigger mouth facilitates feeding on smaller prey."
"X-ray synchrotron microtomography is currently the most sensitive technique for non-destructive investigations of internal structures of fossils. It started ten years ago with primate teeth, but is now widely applied in paleontology," says Paul Tafforeau (ESRF). " We made a first test on one of the Ammonite specimens after a test with a conventional scanner failed, and the results were so impressive that we scanned all the other available samples, discovering nearly each time a radula and for one of them, many other structures."
Ammonite jaws lie just inside the body chamber. The research team's new scans of Baculites, a straight ammonite found world-wide, confirms older research that ammonites had multiple cusps on their radula teeth. The radula can now be seen in exquisite detail: the tallest cusp is 2 mm high, tooth shape varies from saber to comb-like, and teeth are very slender. The jaw is typical of this group of ammonites (the aptychophorans) in that the lower jaw is larger than the upper jaw and consists of two halves separated along a midline.
Until recently, the role of ammonites in the marine food web was unknown, although some clues were provided by Landman and colleagues on the shape of the jaw, as well as a 1992 paper by Russian scientists that reconstructed some of the internal structures by slicing fossils..
"The plankton in the Baculites jaws is the first direct evidence of how these uncoiled ammonites fed. This helps in understanding their evolutionary success in the Cretaceous." says Fabrizio Cecca (UPMC).
"Our research suggests several things. First, the radiation of aptychophoran ammonites might be associated with the radiation of plankton during the Early Jurassic," say Landman. "In addition, plankton were severely hit at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary, and the loss of their food source probably contributed to the extinction of ammonites. This research has implications for understanding carbon cycling during this time".
Isabelle Rouget (UPMC) agrees, adding that "we now realize that ammonites occupied a different niche in the food chain than we previously thought."
GRENOBLE, France -- Scientists have discovered direct evidence of the diet of one of the most important group of ammonites, distant relatives of squids, octopuses and cuttlefishes. The discovery may bring a new insight on why they became extinct 65.5 million years ago, at the end of the Cretaceous.
Ammonites are among the world's most well known fossils but until now, there has been no experimental evidence of their place in the food chain. Using synchrotron X-rays, a Franco-American team of scientists led by Isabelle Kruta has discovered exceptionally preserved mouth organs of ammonites, along with the remains of a meal that show that these ammonites dined on plankton. Plankton was largely destroyed in the wake of the same asteroid impact that led to the demise of the dinosaurs and other species. After losing their source of food, ammonites and many other marine groups could not survive this cataclysmic event. The findings are published this week in Science.
Ammonites are extinct relatives of the squid and octopus. The Nautilus, a present-day marine invertebrate, is similar in appearance to many ammonites but is a more distant relative. Ammonites appeared about 400 million years ago (the Early Devonian) and experienced a population explosion in the early Jurassic. In fact, ammonites became such an abundant and diverse part of the marine fauna that they are used by paleontologists as classic "index" fossils to determine the relative ages of marine Mesozoic rocks in which they are found.
The team of researchers, led by Isabelle Kruta (MNHN, CNRS, UPMC), used the ESRF to perform X-ray scans of exceptional quality of Baculites fossils found on AMNH expeditions to the Great Plains in the United States. Results suggests that the large group of ammonites to which Baculites belongs, had jaws and radula (a kind of tongue covered with teeth) adapted for eating small prey floating in the water.
The study used synchrotron X-ray microtomography to check the presence, and then digitally reconstruct the mouths of three fossils found in South Dakota. The three-dimensional reconstructions are of such high quality that the jaws and teeth are revealed in their complete form. In addition, one specimen has a tiny snail and three tiny crustaceans in its mouth, one of them having been cut into two parts. Because these planktonic fossils are not found anywhere else on the specimen, the team thinks that the specimen died while eating its last meal rather than being scavenged by these organisms after death.
"I was astonished when I saw the teeth for the first time, and when I found the tiny plankton in the mouth," Isabelle Kruta (MNHN). "For the first time we were able to observe the delicacy of these exceptionally well preserved structures and use high quality details to obtain information on the ecology of these enigmatic animals."
"When you take into consideration the large lower jaws of ammonites in combination with this new information about their teeth, you realize that these animals must have been feeding in a different way from modern carrion-eating Nautilus," says Neil Landman (AMNH). "Ammonites have a surprisingly large lower jaw with slender teeth, but the effect is opposite to that of the wolf threatening to eat Little Red Riding Hood. Here, the bigger mouth facilitates feeding on smaller prey."
"X-ray synchrotron microtomography is currently the most sensitive technique for non-destructive investigations of internal structures of fossils. It started ten years ago with primate teeth, but is now widely applied in paleontology," says Paul Tafforeau (ESRF). " We made a first test on one of the Ammonite specimens after a test with a conventional scanner failed, and the results were so impressive that we scanned all the other available samples, discovering nearly each time a radula and for one of them, many other structures."
Ammonite jaws lie just inside the body chamber. The research team's new scans of Baculites, a straight ammonite found world-wide, confirms older research that ammonites had multiple cusps on their radula teeth. The radula can now be seen in exquisite detail: the tallest cusp is 2 mm high, tooth shape varies from saber to comb-like, and teeth are very slender. The jaw is typical of this group of ammonites (the aptychophorans) in that the lower jaw is larger than the upper jaw and consists of two halves separated along a midline.
Until recently, the role of ammonites in the marine food web was unknown, although some clues were provided by Landman and colleagues on the shape of the jaw, as well as a 1992 paper by Russian scientists that reconstructed some of the internal structures by slicing fossils..
"The plankton in the Baculites jaws is the first direct evidence of how these uncoiled ammonites fed. This helps in understanding their evolutionary success in the Cretaceous." says Fabrizio Cecca (UPMC).
"Our research suggests several things. First, the radiation of aptychophoran ammonites might be associated with the radiation of plankton during the Early Jurassic," say Landman. "In addition, plankton were severely hit at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary, and the loss of their food source probably contributed to the extinction of ammonites. This research has implications for understanding carbon cycling during this time".
Isabelle Rouget (UPMC) agrees, adding that "we now realize that ammonites occupied a different niche in the food chain than we previously thought."
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