Paleontology

Paleontology

Healed scars tag T. rex as predator

Healed wounds on the fossil skull of a Triceratops—wounds that match the size and shape of those that would be made by Tyrannosaurus rex—are a strong sign that the tooth scrapes are a result of attempted predation, not scavenging.

Paleontology

Role of gastroliths in digestion questioned

New analyses of the gastroliths in ostriches are casting doubt on the theory that large, plant-eating dinosaurs swallowed stones to grind up tough vegetation and thereby aid their digestion.

Paleontology

Tracks suggest chase, capture, and after-meal respite

A 1.3-meter-long, S-shaped trail of fossil footprints discovered in southwestern Indiana includes one set of disappearing tracks—suggesting an ancient chase—and an impression where the predator rested after its meal.

Paleontology

Bob, Bob, Bobbin’ Along: Dinosaur buoyancy may explain odd tracks

New lab experiments and computer analyses may explain how some of the heftiest four-legged dinosaurs ever to walk on Earth could have left trackways that include the imprints of only their front feet.

Paleontology

Fossils of Flyers: Bones tell why Atlantic albatross disappeared

Ancient albatross fossils suggest that rising sea levels 400,000 years ago wiped out the North Atlantic population of short-tailed albatross.

Paleontology

Reptile remains fill in fossil record

The fossil remains of a sphenodontian, an ancient, lizardlike reptile, are helping fill a 120-million-year-old gap between this creature's ancestors and today's tuatara, sole survivors of the once prominent group.

Paleontology

Some trilobites grew their own eyeshades

The 380-million-year-old fossil of a trilobite strongly suggests that members of at least some trilobite species were active during the daytime, a lifestyle that scientists previously had only suspected.

Paleontology

Ratzilla: Extinct rodent was big, really big

Scientists who've analyzed the fossilized remains of an extinct South American rodent say that the creatures grew to weigh a whopping 700 kilograms.

Paleontology

Fossils’ ear design hints at aquatic lifestyle

New studies of distinctive skull structures in fossils of one of Earth's earliest-known four-limbed creatures suggest the animal could hear best when it was underwater.

Paleontology

Oh, what a sticky web they wove

A look inside a piece of 130-million-year-old amber has revealed a thin filament of spider silk with sticky droplets that look just like those produced by modern spiders.

Paleontology

Three Species No Moa? Fossil DNA analysis yields surprise

Analyses of genetic material from the fossils of large flightless birds called moas suggest that three types of the extinct birds may not be separate species after all.

Paleontology

A human migration fueled by dung?

When people made their way from Asia to the Americas, the path they took may have been covered in dung.