Seasonal primary productivity of plankton communities appeared with the first ice. This phenomenon, still active today, influences global food webs. These findings, reported in the journal Science, are based on fossil records in sediment cores at different depths. The study was led by the Andalusian Institute of Earth Sciences, a Spanish National Research Council-University of […]
Archive for May, 2013
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Archaeopteryx restored in fossil reshuffle
May 30th, 2013 
Riffin What may be the earliest creature yet discovered on the evolutionary line to birds has been unearthed in China. The fossil animal, which retains impressions of feathers, is dated to be about 160 million years old. Scientists have given it the name Aurornis, which means “dawn bird”. The significance of the find, they tell Nature […]
Tiny ‘Spherules’ Reveal Details About Earth’s Asteroid Impacts
May 28th, 2013 Riffin Researchers are learning details about asteroid impacts going back to Earth’s early history by using a new method for extracting precise information from tiny “spherules” embedded in layers of rock. The spherules were created when asteroids crashed into Earth, vaporizing rock that expanded into space as a giant vapor plume. Small droplets of molten and […]
Earth’s Iron Core Is Surprisingly Weak
May 27th, 2013 Riffin Researchers have used a diamond anvil cell to squeeze iron at pressures as high as 3 million times that felt at sea level to recreate conditions at the center of Earth. The findings could refine theories of how the planet and its core evolved. Through laboratory experiments, postdoctoral researcher Arianna Gleason, left, and Wendy Mao, […]
Drill Holes and Predation Traces versus Abrasion-Induced Artifacts Revealed by Tumbling Experiments
May 26th, 2013 Riffin Drill holes made by predators in prey shells are widely considered to be the most unambiguous bodies of evidence of predator-prey interactions in the fossil record. However, recognition of traces of predatory origin from those formed by abiotic factors still waits for a rigorous evaluation as a prerequisite to ascertain predation intensity through geologic time […]
Fourteen Closely Related Crocodiles Existed Around 5 Million Years Ago
May 22nd, 2013 Riffin Today, the most diverse species of crocodile are found in northern South America and Southeast Asia: As many as six species of alligator and four true crocodiles exist, although no more than two or three ever live alongside one another at the same time. It was a different story nine to about five million years […]
New Study Reveals Patterns of Dinosaur Brain Development
May 21st, 2013 Riffin A new study conducted at the University of Bristol and published online today in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology sheds light on how the brain and inner ear developed in dinosaurs. Stephan Lautenschlager from Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences, together with Tom Hübner from the Niedersächsische Landesmuseum in Hannover, Germany, picked the brains of 150 […]
Fossil Kooteninchela deppi named after the actor Johnny Depp
May 19th, 2013 Riffin A scientist has discovered an ancient extinct creature with ‘scissor hand-like’ claws in fossil records and has named it in honour of his favourite movie star. The 505-million-year-old fossil called Kooteninchela deppi (pronounced Koo-ten-ee-che-la depp-eye), which is a distant ancestor of lobsters and scorpions, was named after the actor Johnny Depp for his starring role […]
The Eloquence of Otoliths Seen in a 23-Million-Year-Old Fish Fossil
May 18th, 2013 Riffin Fish fossils that are about 23 million years old give unprecedented insight into the evolutionary history of the gobioid order, one of the most species-rich groups among the modern bony fishes. Researchers led by paleontologist Professor Bettina Reichenbacher from the Division of Paleontology and Geobiology at the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet […]
Clam Fossils Divulge Secrets of Ecologic Stability
May 17th, 2013 Riffin Clam fossils from the middle Devonian era — some 380 million years ago — now yield a better paleontological picture of the capacity of ecosystems to remain stable in the face of environmental change, according to research published today (May 15) in the online journal PLOS ONE. Trained to examine species abundance — the head […]
