https://phys.org/biology-news/paleontology en-us News about paleontology, important paleontological discoveries and fossil studies Canadian vertebrate paleontologist Aaron Kilmury and a team of researchers from the University of Manitoba have published new research in PeerJ Life and Environment, unveiling the first-ever formal description of microvertebrate fossil assemblages from the late Cenomanian to middle Turonian periods in Manitoba, Canada. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-canadian-paleontologists-microvertebrate-faunal-assemblages.html Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 03 Aug 2023 00:10:01 EDT news610211530 Otodus megalodon, the biggest shark of all time, has long captured the imaginations of paleontologists and the public alike. Scientific fascination spawns from the sheer enormity of their fossilized teeth. As big as human hands and serrated like kitchen knives, they were used for cutting down whales unlucky enough to encounter these sharks. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-meg-truth-extinct-mega-shark.html Plants & Animals Paleontology & Fossils Wed, 02 Aug 2023 11:20:01 EDT news610193287 There could be a new contender for heaviest animal to ever live. While today's blue whale has long held the title, scientists have dug up fossils from an ancient giant that could tip the scales. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-heaviest-animal-ancient-whale-peruvian.html Plants & Animals Paleontology & Fossils Wed, 02 Aug 2023 11:12:55 EDT news610193569 Scientists from St Petersburg University as part of a research team have studied bones of hadrosaurid dinosaurs, or duck-billed dinosaurs, found in Chukotka. They were able to confirm that 66 million years ago the climate in the area was much milder than what had been previously believed. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-paleontologists-dinosaur-fossils-chukotka-russia.html Ecology Paleontology & Fossils Wed, 02 Aug 2023 10:23:02 EDT news610190578 The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) announces the oldest swimming jellyfish in the fossil record with the newly named Burgessomedusa phasmiformis. These findings are announced in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-oldest-species-jellyfish.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 01 Aug 2023 19:00:01 EDT news610100880 A new type of analysis of a spectacular 120-million-year-old fossil skeleton of the extinct early bird Jeholornis from northeastern China has revealed the oldest evidence for birds eating leaves, marking the earliest known evolution of arboreal plant-eating among birds. https://phys.org/news/2023-08-fossil-reveals-leaf-eating-earliest-birds.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 01 Aug 2023 10:06:03 EDT news610103161 Have you ever heard of the Jehol Biota, a diverse assemblage of plants and animals during the Mesozoic Era that lived in what is now northern China? The Jehol Biota, which includes the earliest known flowering plants, feathered dinosaurs and early birds, had a high level of biodiversity and biomass compared to other contemporaneous lagerstätten. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-volcanic-phosphorus-boosted-jehol-biota.html Ecology Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 31 Jul 2023 15:49:03 EDT news610037341 Around 262 million years ago, during the middle Permian Period, a new family of reptiles emerged. Pareiasaurs—meaning "cheek lizards," a reference to the flat flanges of bone that make up their cheeks—had skulls covered in bony growths and bumps, and bony plates on their bodies. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-gigantic-extinct-reptile-adult-black.html Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 31 Jul 2023 13:30:01 EDT news610028748 The origin of bees is tens of millions of years older than most previous estimates, a new study shows. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-bees-evolved-ancient-supercontinent-earlier.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 31 Jul 2023 11:11:00 EDT news610020655 The ability of most mammals to maintain a relatively constant and high body temperature is considered a key adaptation, enabling them to successfully colonize new habitats and harsh environments. Eager to determine how this ability evolved, some scientists proposed that a particular region of the mammal skull—the anterior nasal cavity, which houses structures known as the maxilloturbinals—plays a pivotal role in body temperature maintenance. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-fossil-skulls-animal-blooded.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Fri, 28 Jul 2023 13:01:03 EDT news609768062 A multi-institutional team of paleontologists has identified a new dinosaur species dug up in Thailand in 2012. In their paper published in the journal Diversity, the group describes where the fossil was found, its characteristics and its condition. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-dinosaur-species-thailand.html Paleontology & Fossils Fri, 28 Jul 2023 09:50:01 EDT news609752582 The differences are in the details: Special 3D shape analyses of the jaws and dentitions of cave bears and brown bears living at the same time from the fossil site in the caves of Goyet in Belgium show their clearly different food spectrum. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-competition-food-jaw-analyses-cave.html Plants & Animals Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 27 Jul 2023 15:23:02 EDT news609690181 A perfectly preserved turtle fossil from Lower Bavaria yields important clues about both the species and the habitat that existed in southern Germany 150 million years ago. The fossil is the best-preserved specimen of Solnhofia parsonsi found to date. Its forelimbs and hind limbs are comparatively short, suggesting that the turtle lived near the coast. This in contrast with today's sea turtles, which have elongated flippers and live in the open sea. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-turtle-fossil-clues-habitat-million.html Paleontology & Fossils Wed, 26 Jul 2023 16:57:03 EDT news609609421 Researchers have described a new species of armored reptile that lived near the time of the first appearance of dinosaurs. With bony plates on its backbone, this archosaur fossil reveals that armor was a boomerang trait in the story of dinosaur and pterosaur evolution: the group's ancestors were armored, but this characteristic was lost and then independently re-evolved multiple times later among specialized dinosaurs like ankylosaurs, stegosaurs, and others. The study is published today in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-archosaur-species-precursor-dinosaurs-pterosaurs.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Wed, 26 Jul 2023 14:27:22 EDT news609600438 Anyone who has taken a long road trip or bike ride has used a product of the spurge plant family—rubber. The spurge family, or Euphorbiaceae, includes economically valuable plants like the rubber tree, castor oil plant, poinsettia and cassava. Newly identified fossils found in Argentina suggest that a group of spurges took a trip of their own tens of millions of years ago. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-spurge-purge-fossils-reveal-ancient.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 25 Jul 2023 15:30:10 EDT news609517805 For the first time ever, researchers have been able to study the form of microorganisms from the early days of evolution some 1.5 billion years ago. These microorganisms are of exceptional importance for our understanding of the development of early life. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-discovery-oldest-3d-preserved-microorganisms.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 24 Jul 2023 10:52:51 EDT news609414767 Researchers at the Fundación Conjunto Paleontológico de Teruel-Dinópolis/ Museo Aragonés de Paleontología, Spain, have released the description of a new upper Jurassic dinosaur based on fossil remains found in Spain. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-discovery-ornithopod-mystery-unidentified-large.html Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 24 Jul 2023 10:33:32 EDT news609413606 A badger-like mammal was sinking its teeth into the ribs of a dinosaur three times its size when they were buried in volcanic ash 125 million years ago, capturing the pair in a deadly embrace. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-mammal-dinosaur-once-in-a-lifetime-fossil.html Paleontology & Fossils Sat, 22 Jul 2023 12:40:02 EDT news608902367 One of New Zealand's most exceptional fossil sites may soon be open to scientists again following a land purchase that saved it from commercial mining. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-worth-spectacular-fossil-site-nz.html Paleontology & Fossils Fri, 21 Jul 2023 12:11:03 EDT news609160261 A research group led by Professor Toshihiro Yamada from the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Hokkaido University, found an exceptionally well-preserved fossil of a Wataria parvipora forest which was almost exclusively accompanied by fossils of Byttneriophyllum leaves. Their findings were published in the journal Scientific Reports. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-exquisitely-fossil-forest-japan-reconstruct.html Paleontology & Fossils Fri, 21 Jul 2023 11:39:29 EDT news609158364 The study of a new species of coelacanth from the Middle Triassic period, with a strange morphology for these fish known as "living fossil," show the formation of several species in a short time, after a mass extinction that occurred 252 million years ago, with more than 80% of marine species disappearing. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-fossil-coelacanths-switzerland-mass-extinction.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 20 Jul 2023 11:56:04 EDT news609072962 A new species of ancient gar fish that thrived in a marine environment 66 million years ago has been identified by an international team of paleontologists. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-discovery-unveils-ancient-marine-gar.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 20 Jul 2023 11:44:03 EDT news609072241 Sabertooth cats make up a diverse group of long-toothed predators that roamed Africa around 6–7 million years ago, around the time that hominins—the group that includes modern humans—began to evolve. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-paleontologists-species-sabertooth-cat.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 20 Jul 2023 11:00:01 EDT news609061161 A team of paleontologists with members from France, Brazil and Argentina has found evidence of a third type of monkey crossing the Atlantic Ocean millions of years ago, making the trip from Africa to South America. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the group describes a tooth they found embedded in rock along the Juruá River in Amazonian, Brazil, and their theories about where its former owner might fit in the animal kingdom. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-ancient-tooth-kind-monkey-africa.html Paleontology & Fossils Thu, 20 Jul 2023 08:58:33 EDT news609062307 Small pterosaurs were born with comparatively strong, large wings, which meant they could leave the nest swiftly, while the cumbersome baby large pterosaurs required parental protection from predators, scientists have discovered. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-large-pterosaurs-parents-smaller-earlier.html Paleontology & Fossils Wed, 19 Jul 2023 10:27:31 EDT news608981247 Oxygen didn't catalyze the swift blossoming of Earth's first multicellular organisms. The results of a new study defy a 70-year-old assumption about what caused an explosion of oceanic fauna hundreds of millions of years ago. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-assumption-higher-oxygen-multicellular-earth.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 18 Jul 2023 14:59:03 EDT news608911135 Nematodes (roundworms) are distributed worldwide in almost all habitats. The Mermithidae, a family of nematodes larger than others, are obligate invertebrate parasites which occur in insects, millipedes, crustaceans, spiders, mollusks and earthworms. They can affect the morphology, physiology, and even the behavior of their hosts. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-amber-reveals-evolution-parasitism-nematodes.html Evolution Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 18 Jul 2023 11:38:03 EDT news608899081 Though we may often think of fossils purely as the bones of ancient organisms that roamed the Earth millions of years ago, in fact, we are actually able to see evidence of this past roaming itself. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-fossil-trackways-reveal-raptor-prey-pleistocene.html Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 18 Jul 2023 11:10:01 EDT news608895416 Canadian and Chinese scientists have described an unusual fossil from around 125 million years ago that shows a dramatic moment in time when a carnivorous mammal attacked a larger plant-eating dinosaur. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-unusual-fossil-rare-evidence-mammal.html Paleontology & Fossils Tue, 18 Jul 2023 11:00:01 EDT news608887900 For approximately 3,000 years, generations of green sea turtles have returned to the same seagrass meadows to eat. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-green-sea-turtles-years-ecologist.html Ecology Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 17 Jul 2023 15:00:02 EDT news608804599