Paleontology

A new study re-examined these “plant” fossils from the mid-20th century and found that they weren’t plants at all: they were the fossilized remains of baby turtles. The plants in question had been…

Hugh Gray was taking his usual post-church walk around Loch Ness in Scotland on a November Sunday in 1933. His amble was disrupted when he saw something bobbing above the water two or three feet from…

Thalattosuchians are ancient relatives of the ancestors of modern-day crocodiles, a biological aunt if you will, and part of the head, backbone, and limbs of Turnersuchus hingleyae have been found on…

Scientists just published a study of what may prove to be China's most ancient human fossil. The researchers employed microCT, geometric morphometry, and classical morphology techniques to…

Europe’s past booms and busts, often driven by natural changes in climate, has been revealed using thousand-year-old pollen, spores and charcoal particles fossilized in glacial ice. The analysis of…

Crinoids are unusually beautiful and graceful members of the phylum Echinodermata. They resemble an underwater flower swaying in an ocean current. But make no mistake they are marine animals.…

Previously Calycoceras Tarrantense, this ammonite is now Conlinoceras tarrantense after J.P. Conlin, a famous early 20th-century fossil collector from Texas, USA. Ammonite expert Bill Cobban used…

Horseshoe crabs are marine and brackish water arthropods of the order Xiphosura — a slowly evolving, conservative taxa. Much like (slow) Water Striders (Aquarius remigis), (relatively sluggish)…

We can trace the lineage of barnacles back to the Middle Cambrian. That is half a billion years of data to sift through.  If you divide that timeline in half yet again, we begin to understand…

A fearsome beast soared above the ancient, vast inland sea once that once covered covering much of outback Queensland. This newly found pterosaur, named Thapunngaka shawi, was discovered in Wanamara…