Paleontology

60-Million-Year-Old Crocodile Ancestor Was Snake Food

A 60-million-year-old relative of crocodiles named Cerrejonisuchus improcerus ("small crocodile from Cerrejon") was likely a food source for Titanoboa, the largest snake the world has ever known, says a new study published this week in the Journa ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 3 2010 - 1:10pm

Scientists Complete Color Palette Of Anchiornis Huxleyi

Writing in the latest issue of Science, researchers say they have identified the vibrant colors that adorned Anchiornis huxleyi, a feathered dinosaur extinct for 150 million years. The discovery may add weight to the idea that dinosaurs first evolved feath ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 4 2010 - 3:44pm

New Evidence Casts Doubt On Bird-From-Dinosaur Theory

A new commentary just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences claims that more evidence is mounting that birds did not evolve from ground-dwelling theropod dinosaurs and challenging decades of accepted theories about the evolution ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 9 2010 - 6:27pm

Unraveling The 400-Million-Year-Old Prototaxites Mystery

Contradictions and puzzles surround Prototaxites, organisms that existed during the Late Silurian to Late Devonian periods-- approximately 420-370 million years ago (ma). The existing fossils resemble tree trunks, yet they are from a time before trees exis ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 11 2010 - 12:44pm

Abydosaurus: New Sauropod Dinosaur Discovered In Utah

A team of paleontologists has discovered a new dinosaur species which belongs to the  same group of gigantic, long-necked, long-tailed, four-legged, plant-eating sauropods as Brachiosaurus. The new species has been dubbed 'Abydosaurus', and its d ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 24 2010 - 1:12am

Ancient Snakes Ate Dinosaur Babies

A 3.5-metre-long snake that lived 67 million years ago made a habit of eating baby sauropods as they first scrambled out of their eggs, say paleontologists writing in PLoS Biology. The conclusion is based on the discovery in India of a nearly complete foss ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 8 2010 - 7:03pm

Asilisaurus Kongwe- New Species Suggests Dinosaurs Older Than Previously Thought

A newly discovered species that shared many characteristics with dinosaurs but fell just outside of the dinosaur family lived 10 million years earlier than the oldest known dinosaurs. Researchers writing in Nature say the discovery of  Asilisaurus kongwe m ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 8 2010 - 7:03pm

Chicxulub Impact Wiped Out The Dinosaurs, Experts Claim

An asteroid colliding with Earth was responsible for the Cretaceous–Tertiary mass extinction, which wiped out the dinosaurs and more than half of species on Earth, according to a new review published in Science. Scientists have previously argued about whet ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 4 2010 - 3:51pm

I Am A Paleontologist (Music Video)

They Might Be Giants serve up another slice of power pop for kids with "I am a Paleontologist". One of the better videos in their science series. ...

Blog Post - Richard Mankiewicz - Mar 13 2010 - 6:53am

Fedexia Striegeli Provides Earliest Evidence Of Terrestrial Vertebrates

A new genus and species of carnivorous amphibian from western Pennsylvania, Fedexia striegeli, provides the earliest widespread evidence of terrestrial Vertebrates, say researchers from Carnegie Museum of Natural History. The fossil skull, found in 2004 ne ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 8 2010 - 7:04pm