The scientific fields of geology and paleontology owe much of their early advancements to an uneducated, impoverished, amateur fossil hunter in the early 1800s. However, much of the credit for Mary Anning’s work was not granted to her during her lifetime. The reason for this was threefold – she was from a poverty-stricken, working-class family, …
Tag: fossils
Dinosaur Chompers May Have Inhibited Their Ability to Chow Down
Carnivorous dinosaurs were thought to have ferocious bites that are unimaginable compared to the animals we see today. However, new research suggests that the bite force of some of these meat eaters was not as threatening as we might perceive. In addition, the formation of their teeth also made the “puncture and pull” method more …
How One Mass Extinction Helped Pave the Way for the Dinosaurs
An asteroid may have hit the planet and caused the mass extinction of the dinosaurs, but what happened to Earth before then? As it turns out, a previous mass extinction may have paved the way for the dinosaurs. Recently, researchers took a look at all of the tetrapod tracks published over the past few decades. …
New Fossil Reveals When Homo Sapiens Migrated Out of Africa
When did our predecessors, Homo sapiens, actually explore the grasslands of Saudi Arabia? According to a new find, they may have stumbled into this area a lot sooner than we originally thought. But let’s back up for a moment. It’s important to recognize that our species first appeared in Africa about 300,000 years ago (Dunham, …
What Does This 200 million-year-old Dinosaur “Bite” Tell Us?
We know that dinosaurs preyed on one another when they roamed the planet, but we haven’t always had strong evidence of how the food chain may have worked millions of years ago. Now, one dinosaur “bite” is helping researchers gain a glimpse into what it might have been like to live in a “Dog Eat …
Has the World’s Largest Dinosaur Finally Been Unearthed?
Was the world’s largest dinosaur finally unearthed last year? One paper that was just published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. claims that this may be the case. (Phillips, 2017) According to a new report, the Patagotitan might be the largest dinosaur to have ever walked the earth. The name, which was just given …
A Crocodile-like Creature Once Terrorized the Biggest, Baddest Dinosaurs
Dinosaurs were some of the most menacing creatures to ever walk the planet, but what about crocodiles? Believe it or not, there was once a fearsome crocodile-like animal that roamed the Earth and struck fear into the hearts of dinosaurs. The Razanandrongobe sakalavae, or Razana for short, lived during the Middle Jurassic period in Madagascar. …
This Newly Discovered Dinosaur Flawless is Nearly Perfect
When archaeologists stumble upon a new dinosaur fossil, they never know what they’ll turn up. In some cases, they are fragmented remains that are difficult to analyze. In other instances, the fossils are in impeccable condition. Needless to say, researchers always hope for the best, and that’s exactly what they recently found in Montana. (Arbour & …
New ‘Chicken-like’ Dinosaur Discovered in Africa
Although it might feel like every dinosaur that ever walked the planet has been discovered, we’re still turning up new fossils in the year 2017. Scientists have announced the discovery of a new dinosaur that may have been the “smaller African contemporary” of the North American Tyrannosaurus Rex. It has been named Chenanisaurus barbaricus, and …
We Now Know What Dinosaurs May Have Really Looked Like
Some people speculate that most dinosaurs had feathers, while others still believe it’s up for debate. We may not end the discussion anytime soon, but a new study has revealed additional details to help us draw more accurate conclusions. In a report published in Nature Communications, researchers shared what they found when they used high-powered …