Scientists who famously discovered the lobe-finned fish fossil Tiktaalik roseae, a species with some of the clearest evidence of the evolutionary transition from fish to limbed animals, have described another new species of predatory fossil lobe-finned fish fish from the same time and place. By describing more Devonian species, they’re gaining a greater understanding of […]
Posts Tagged ‘Russel T Sajeev’
Oxygen-Poor ‘Boring’ Ocean Challenged Evolution of Early Life
March 27th, 2013 
Riffin A research team led by biogeochemists at the University of California, Riverside has filled in a billion-year gap in our understanding of conditions in the early ocean during a critical time in the history of life on Earth. It is now well accepted that appreciable oxygen first accumulated in the atmosphere about 2.4 to 2.3 […]
WFS Profiles : Barnum Brown (1873-1963)
March 26th, 2013 Riffin Barnum Brown has been called the greatest “bone hunter” of all time, as well as the last of the great dinosaur hunters. A forward thinking scientist with a successful career, Brown is most famous for discovering the king of the dinosaurs, which was aptly named Tyrannosaurus rex, or the “king of the tyrant lizards.” But […]
Megavolcanoes Tied to Pre-Dinosaur Mass Extinction: Apparent Sudden Climate Shift Could Have Analog Today
March 25th, 2013 Riffin Scientists examining evidence across the world from New Jersey to North Africa say they have linked the abrupt disappearance of half of earth’s species 200 million years ago to a precisely dated set of gigantic volcanic eruptions. The eruptions may have caused climate changes so sudden that many creatures were unable to adapt — possibly […]
Structural Extremes in a Cretaceous Dinosaur
March 24th, 2013 Riffin Fossils of the Early Cretaceous dinosaur, Nigersaurus taqueti, document for the first time the cranial anatomy of a rebbachisaurid sauropod. Its extreme adaptations for herbivory at ground-level challenge current hypotheses regarding feeding function and feeding strategy among diplodocoids, the larger clade of sauropods that includes Nigersaurus. We used high resolution computed tomography, stereolithography, and standard […]
Fossil Bird Study On Extinction Patterns Could Help Today’s Conservation Efforts
March 23rd, 2013 Riffin A new University of Florida study of nearly 5,000 Haiti bird fossils shows contrary to a commonly held theory, human arrival 6,000 years ago didn’t cause the island’s birds to die simultaneously. Although many birds perished or became displaced during a mass extinction event following the first arrival of humans to the Caribbean islands, fossil […]
Scientists Discover ‘Lubricant’ for Earth’s Tectonic Plates: Hidden Magma Layer Could Play Role in Earthquakes
March 21st, 2013 Riffin Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego have found a layer of liquefied molten rock in Earth’s mantle that may be acting as a lubricant for the sliding motions of the planet’s massive tectonic plates. The discovery may carry far-reaching implications, from solving basic geological functions of the planet to a better […]
Sea Floor Earthquake Zones Can Act Like a ‘Magnifying Lens’ Strengthening Tsunamis Beyond What Was Through Possible
March 20th, 2013 Riffin The earthquake zones off of certain coasts — like those of Japan and Java — make them especially vulnerable to tsunamis, according to a new study. They can produce a focusing point that creates massive and devastating tsunamis that break the rules for how scientists used to think tsunamis work. Until now, it was largely […]
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Tags: Costas Synolakis, Riffin T Sajeev, Russel T Sajeev, Utku Kanoglu, WFS, world fossil society 
No Comments »A New Snake Skull from the Paleocene of Bolivia Sheds Light on the Evolution of Macrostomatans
March 19th, 2013 Riffin Macrostomatan snakes, one of the most diverse extant clades of squamates, display an impressive arsenal of cranial features to consume a vast array of preys. In the absence of indisputable fossil representatives of this clade with well-preserved skulls, the mode and timing of these extraordinary morphological novelties remain obscure. Here, we report the discovery of […]
New fossils show that four different types of birds had stiff feathers on their legs.
March 18th, 2013 Riffin More than 100 million years ago, birds living in what is now China sported wings on their legs, a new study of fossils suggests. Researchers found evidence of large leg feathers in 11 bird specimens from China’s Shandong Tianyu Museum of Nature. The feathers suggest that early birds had four wings, which may have played […]
