If you are not a vertebrate paleontologist, or play one on TV, what do you think vertebrate paleontologists do? If you were a kid who knew all dinosaur names, but now only remember that period occasionally when paleontology appears in the media, what would you expect you’d hear if you suddenly appeared at the annual [...]

Does these look like lichens to you? According to Gregory Retallack, they should. Yesterday, Nature published an article by Retallack that makes a radical claim: the Ediacaran Biota (635-542 mya) of bizarre creatures that preceded the Cambrian Explosion were not pneumatic semi-mobile marine animals, but instead sessile land-dwelling lichens and protists living high and very [...]

There is something curious about the sedimentary rocks laid down around the world 250 million years ago, at the height of Earth’s greatest extinction: they are often riddled with filaments, and no one is sure what they are. Nothing like them has been found in rocks before or since. What seems apparent, and what everyone [...]

As I write, the Snowmass Water and Sanitation Department District is busy digging, damming, and filling the Ziegler Reservoir on top of  one of the world’s only known high-altitude Ice Age fossil sites — and “without question” the world’s finest mastodon site, according to Denver Museum of Nature and Science VP Kirk Johnson — near [...]

Last week, a very prominent artist in the paleontology community somewhat publicly blew a gasket. His tirade started a conversation that has been sorely in need of attention for some time now. At issue is a fundamental conflict of interests: between science and its tradition of cumulative knowledge, and the rights of the artists who [...]

Penguins are perhaps the most popular birds on Earth, thanks in equal measure to their incredible life cycles and charming tuxedo-clad appearances. Among their long list of superlatives, penguins can survive sub-freezing temperatures and gale force winds, dive over 1600 feet deep, hold their breath for more than 15 minutes, and survive with no food [...]

Iguanodon of tradition (or Iguanodon sensu lato, if you will) was a huge, sprawling monster, containing numerous species spread across about 40 million years of geological history. Welcome to the second article in this series (part 1 here). In the previous article we looked at the Purbeck Limestone iguanodontian Owenodon – originally named as a [...]

One of the most familiar and historically significant of dinosaur names is Iguanodon, named in 1825 for teeth and bones discovered in the Lower Cretaceous rocks of the Cuckfield region of East Sussex, southern England. Everyone who’s ever picked up a dinosaur book will be familiar with the legendary – yet mostly apocryphal – tale [...]

“Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone? All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream.” “A Dream Within A Dream” by Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) There is lot fuzz about the discovery [...]

The first day of the “Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations” was a great success – half a million people visited the official opening of the first World’s Fair at Crystal Palace, a 20 acres large greenhouse located in Hyde Park of central London. Fig.1. Lithograph by Joseph Nash depicting the [...]

In October 1845 British geologist Charles Lyell was visiting Boston, when he noted an advertisement proclaiming that a “Dr.” Albert C. Koch would exhibit the 114 foot long skeleton of “that colossal and terrible reptile the sea serpent” to the paying public. Lyell dismissed this claim soon as a fraud , as the skeleton was [...]

Dana Hunter is compiling a list of Pioneering Women in the Geosciences, so here a name  closely linked with the geology of the Dolomites. The Scottish Maria Matilda Ogilvie Gordon (1864-1939, the photo shows her in 1900, image in public domain), or simply May, was the oldest daughter of a clergy family with eight children, [...]

The flyby of asteroid 2012 DA14 and especially the past and present Russian meteors are impressive reminders that the terrestrial biosphere can be affected also by extraterrestrial forces. However contrary to headlines by the general media the connection between mass extinctions and large meteor impacts is still poorly understand. The Scaglia Variegata and Scaglia Cinerea [...]

“No subject has lately excited more curiosity and general interest among geologists and the public than the question of the Antiquity of the Human Race…[]” Lyell 1863 The debate over the age of the earth generated an even more intriguing question: how old is humankind? Written records date back some thousands of years, but geological [...]

In the 19th century  the small island of Gilolo (today Halmahera), located in the Moluccas archipelago, was still one of the most remote places on earth. In march 1858 a letter delivered to the nearest post office, located on the island of Ternate, was first sent  to Singapore. From there a ship of the “British [...]

One of the most astounding scientific discoveries of the 20th century was initiated by a simple phone call, early in the morning of December 22, 1938. “Miss Latimer, we got here one and a half ton of fish, maybe you are interested?“ Marjorie Courtaney-Latimer, curator of the little museum of East London (South Africa), went [...]

Tat: “Does the earth seem to you unmoving, father?” Hermes: “No, my son. It is the only thing full of movement, and at the same time stationary. Would it not be absurd for the nourisher of all things, the producer of and begetter of all, to be motionless?…[]“ “Corpus Hermeticum” 100-300 A.D. According to Aristotelian [...]

“History of Geology” will be dedicated until the end of the world year to two topics – the evolution of paleoart and – appropriately – the supposed age and end of the earth. A first glimpse on paleoart introduced the early soft-tissue reconstructions of animals, however also other organisms are worth to be studied, reconstructed [...]

A new species of feathered dinosaur has been discovered, and its gigantic size makes it the largest-known feathered animal, living or extinct. Yutyrannus huali lived in northeastern China 125 million years ago, according to a group of scientists in China, where three specimens of the bipedal tyrannosaur were found. A description of the new dinosaur [...]

LAS VEGAS–Three-dimensional medical imaging of two baby woolly mammoths from Siberia named Lyuba and Khroma has given scientists an unprecedented view of the internal anatomy of these creatures. At the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, Ethan Shirley and Daniel Fisher of the University of Michigan and their colleagues presented the results of [...]

As movie theaters across the U.S. prepare to welcome throngs of bipedal primates to screenings of Rise of the Planet of the Apes this weekend, it seems appropriate to reflect on a time in Earth’s history when nonhuman apes actually did reign supreme. It’s hard to imagine, because so few ape species exist today and [...]

Fitting fossils together to assemble massive dinosaur skeletons is certainly no small feat. Fleshing one out—inside and out—from tooth to tail is an even more challenging undertaking, especially when the subject is an 18-meter-long sauropod. Experts in animal nutrition, sports medicine, biomechanics and materials science joined paleontologists to re-create a full-sized model of Mamenchisaurus that [...]

A rare horned dinosaur known as Torosaurus may not be a distinct species, after all, according to a presentation given Friday at the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology in Bristol, England. Researchers have long recognized similarities between Torosaurus and Triceratops, the main distinctions being that Torosaurus is larger and has an expanded [...]

Before everyone gets their feathers ruffled that this casting call is looking for a male, just know he is to be a co-host to a female. Now that that is clear….. SEEKING CO-HOST FOR MAJOR CABLE NETWORK Major Cable Network dedicated to Nature, Science and Exploration, is currently casting a Co-Host for new project examining [...]

When a big fossil discovery is announced, the initial imagery that floods the news outlets is carefully controlled by the lab responsible for the discovery. That is usually followed by a period of rougher, often inaccurate attempts to reconstruct the animal by aspiring illustrators or adoring geeky fans around the globe. But then an amazing [...]

Last month, we posted a wide variety of science-art here at Symbiartic. We thought it’d be nice to post an overview in case you missed or wanted to revisit any. Enjoy!

Following our SciArt of the Day tradition of having something silly on the weekends (we’ve only been doing this 3 weeks – we have traditions?!?) I bring you Raven Amos’s Cretaceous Critter Coffee Company, starring the lovely caramel-brown Tropeognathus that also features as Raven’s blog banner. This image makes me crave coffee on a hot dusty day. [...]

  Ancient technologies on the human scale can be in danger of being lost, buried under the sedimentary layers of modern life. Blacksmiths like Darrell Markewitz of The Wareham Forge keep these technologies alive, not just in words and study, but in his hands. An expert in blacksmithing including Bronze Age and Viking technologies, Darrell [...]

  I’ve seen a lot of shades of blue in Craig Dylke’s artwork over the last few years – the powerful blues in this piece just make this moment of action, frozen in time leap out at the viewer. An admitted mosasaur-fan, Craig explores ancient oceans and forests in his 3D images, and here shows [...]

Should an illustration of a dinosaur skeleton be considered as functional as a pair of jeans? Watching this TED Talk with Johanna Blakley recently discussing copyright and fashion, she points out that some creative industries have little or not copyright. The world of fashion. Automobile design. The tattoo design industry.  The reason, Blakley points out, [...]

  Q: How do you fill a dinosaur exhibit with feathers? A: Put out an open call to the blogosphere’s paleo artists. ART Evolved is a paleo-themed group art blog created by educators Craig Dylke and Peter Bond that I’ve had the pleasure of being involved in since its inception 4 years ago this month. [...]

Merry Merry from Glendon and Kalliopi! Still thinking I need to paint a Candy Cane Crinoid Forest. For  more Holiday Science-Art with a paleo-theme, check out Clever Girl, Love in the Time of the Chasmosaurs, The Flying Trilobite, Dinosaur Tracking and Green Tea and Velociraptors (Portions of this post originally appeared on The Flying Trilobite.)

When I opened the November 2011 issue of Scientific American and leafed through it, I was immediately drawn to one of the highlights of the issue: illustrations for the cover story about The First Americans. They were done by illustrator Tyler Jacobson, with art direction by Michael Mrak and Jen Christiansen. Here in the interview below, [...]

Whenever I tell people that I’m a scientific illustrator, I get one of three responses: 1. No pulse: We’re flatlining here. Talking to an economist/I-banker and they could care less. One of us will awkwardly change the subject. 2. Honestly clueless: “A scientiffiwha… I’m sorry, what is that!?” Depending on how much they loved dinos [...]

Over the last few days, I and my friends and colleagues from the University of Southampton’s vertebrate palaeontology research group visited Lyme Regis for the 2013 Fossil Festival, a big, fun event attended by 1000s of people and by most palaeontologically- and geologically-oriented people in the southern half of the UK. There are stalls and [...]

Time for a quick look at another temnospondyl group. Today, we focus on the tupilakosaurids, a group of short-limbed, blunt-skulled, long-bodied Permo-Triassic temnos. Ossified ceratobranchials, poorly ossified limbs and long and flexible bodies all suggest that they were fully aquatic though – like some other aquatic temnospondyl groups – their bones lack lateral line sulci. [...]

Mesozoic dinosaurs of several lineages famously possessed horns, frills, bony bosses, crests, frills, blah blah blah – you’ve heard all this a million times before. Pterosaurs were flamboyant creatures too. Why did these animals possess these so-called exaggerated structures? Together with Dave Hone, I’ve just published my latest missive on this issue (Hone & Naish [...]

Good news: I’ve decided to treat you all to yet another article on temnospondyls. This time we look at several (mostly) Permian groups – the sclerocephalids, archegosaurids and their relatives – that have sometimes (but not consistently) been grouped together as the Archegosauroidea or Archegosauriformes. As before, I have to note that there are strongly [...]

Continuing with the theme of the previous article on trematosauroid temnospondyls, I thought I may as well publish another randomly chosen chunk of my grand, super-long temnospondyl review. This time we look at the trimerorhachids. While there are diverse and often conflicting opinions on the phylogenetic affinities of the many temnospondyl lineages, it’s generally agreed [...]

Long-time Tet Zoo readers will know of my various efforts to get through all the temnospondyl lineages. Alas, I just haven’t been able to finish this grand project due to my getting stuck somewhere round about dissorophoids (see below for links to previous Tet Zoo temnospondyl articles). In frustration, here’s a section from late in [...]

We’ve named another new pterosaur! Once again, the open-access online journal PLOS ONE hosts a paper that I and colleagues (Martin Simpson and Gareth Dyke, both of the University of Southampton) have published on a new taxon (Naish et al. 2013). This is the third paper I’ve published in PLOS ONE so far this year, and [...]

The Tet Zoo crocodile series is not yet finished, and here we embark on part VI in the series (see below for links to previous parts). This time, we come to the Nile crocodile lineage, and I refer here to a ‘lineage’ rather than to a species since there’s now good evidence that C. niloticus [...]

Another day, another new paper out in PLOS ONE. Today sees the publication of the new azhdarchid pterosaur Eurazhdarcho langendorfensis Vremir et al., 2013, a new species from the Upper Cretaceous Sebeş Formation of the Transylvanian Basin in Romania (Vremir et al. 2013). ‘Vremir’ is my good friend Mátyás Vremir; he worked together with Alex [...]

It’s January 21st, meaning that Tetrapod Zoology is another year older and has now been going for more than seven years. Time once again to look back at the year that’s passed… or, the year as seen from my own personal, Tet Zoo-themed perspective. As per previous birthday events (or, blogoversaries, or whatever), I’m going [...]

Evolution has a knack for confronting us with strange and unexpected questions. One of them echoed through the halls of the Collections Centre of the National Museum of Scotland, not too long ago: “Why does a fish need a sacrum!?” Lauren Sallan was peering through her microscope, studying a fossil specimen of Tarrasius, when she [...]

The history of penguins in Africa is a history of false starts. The first penguin pioneers that settled Africa millions of years ago all went extinct. But the penguins didn’t give up. They came back, swept there by ocean currents, and repopulated the African coasts. That’s what the palaeontologists Daniel Ksepka and Daniel Thomas conclude [...]