Happy to welcome @fishfetisher.bsky.social, our new curator of fishes here at the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History! 🐟🐠🧬
Emily Troyer@fishfetisher.bsky.social · 2d agoHey, it's me
Paleobiology Research Group at OU
@oupaleobiology.bsky.social
Our labs investigate the diversity, ecology, & evolution of fossil invertebrates at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History & University of Oklahoma
Emily Troyer@fishfetisher.bsky.social · 2d ago
New paper w/ @astigall.bsky.social! 🧪 "Species-level diversity dynamics during the Great Ordovician biodiversification event: a phylodynamic case study of Laurentian brachiopod lineages" Link to paper: authors.elsevier.com/c/1ngnZ73N~L...
Exactly four years ago today, I was doing fieldwork on Anticosti Island celebrating my first official day on the job as joint Assistant Curator of Invertebrate Paleontology at the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History and Assistant Professor of Paleobiology at The University of Oklahoma!
As we approach the final week of our 7th field season on Anticosti Island, we've overcome new challenges and setbacks this year. Nevertheless, we have also made many new discoveries & worked with an incredible team, including a remarkable group of students from @oupaleobiology.bsky.social & the AMNH
Huge congratulations to my graduate student, @crowleyk.bsky.social, as the recipient of the prestigious Winifred Goldring Award from the Association for Women Geoscientists! Way to go Kiera!
News
Winifred Goldring Award to Kiera Crowley Graduate student Kiera Crowley (MS: 2024-2026, PhD: 2026-present) is a recipient of the the highly prestigious Winifred Goldring Award from the Association …
daveyfwright.wordpress.com
Incredibly proud of my master's student, Nicolas Bell, who successfully defended his thesis today on "Environmental controls on Late Ordovician (Katian) crinoid feeding ecology"! @oupaleobiology.bsky.social
Congratulations to Nicolas Bell (@leptaena.bsky.social lab) for successfully defending his Master's thesis: "Environmental controls on Late Ordovician (Katian) crinoid feeding ecology." Great job!
“This is why we work to make our collections accessible to researchers around the world,” Wright stated in the press release. "There are simply too many fossils to study over one person’s career. There’s more than a lifetime’s worth of discoveries waiting to be found.” 🧪
OU paleontologists discover rare soft tissue preserved in 450 million year old fossil
University of Oklahoma paleontologists recently discovered a 450-million-year-old fossilized soft tissue from a species related to the starfish, a finding that is one of two known examples of this typ...
normantranscript.com
OU paleontologists @leptaena.bsky.social and @daveyfwright.bsky.social make one-in-a-million fossil discovery
OU paleontologists make one-in-a-million fossil discovery
Officials say an extraordinarily rare discovery has been made by a University of Oklahoma palentologistBefore the oldest dinosaur, before animals or even plant
okcfox.com
New paper from the Wright lab about fossil preservation in crinoid echinoderms! 🧪
Dr. Davey F. Wright ⛏️🦕🧬@daveyfwright.bsky.social · 3mo agoNew paper about phosphatization of skeletal microstructure in fossil crinoids & comparisons with extant species. Somehow, this is the 2nd paper I've been involved in this year about fossil preservation and soft part anatomy in crinoid echinoderms and a very cool time for crinoid taphonomy!
🌈 Diversity makes our community stronger The Paleo Society appreciates each one of you who makes science richer and more welcoming. Happy Pride Month! 🏳️🌈 🏳️⚧️
Cannot explain how much I love using fossils to study biological evolution & the history of life. From writing code for computational analyses, working with museum specimens, or writing scientific papers, I truly enjoy the process of *doing* science. I'm so incredibly lucky to be a paleontologist
Absolutely overjoyed to share our new paper describing the oldest occurrence of soft-tissue preservation in crinoid echinoderms and their ecological significance 🧪
Exceptional soft-tissue preservation reveals the oldest evidence for tube feet and their ecological significance in crinoids
Abstract. Tube feet are extensions of the echinoderm water vascular system that play essential roles in feeding and ecology in living crinoids. However, on
royalsocietypublishing.org
Excited to share my newest paper with @daveyfwright.bsky.social and colleagues on soft tissue preservation of tube feet in an Ordovician crinoid! doi.org/10.1098/rsos...
Exceptional soft-tissue preservation reveals the oldest evidence for tube feet and their ecological significance in crinoids
Abstract. Tube feet are extensions of the echinoderm water vascular system that play essential roles in feeding and ecology in living crinoids. However, on
doi.org
The New Paleobiology Database User Guide is here! This is the second edition of the volume designed to be a comprehensive guide for Paleobiology Database users -- escholarship.org/uc/item/9gg7...
Congratulations to MSc graduates Nicolas Bell (Cole Lab) and Kiera Crowley!
Congratulations to Kiera Crowley (Wright lab) for successfully defending her MS thesis today! Her thesis research focused on "The ecological and developmental dimensions of a post-extinction radiation in Ordovician-Silurian crinoids." Fantastic job Kiera!
Congratulations to Alysha Zazubec (Cole lab) for successfully passing their PhD Candidacy exams!
Congratulations to OU paleobiologist Dr. @leptaena.bsky.social for receiving the 2026 Teaching Excellence Award from the Mewbourne College at The University of Oklahoma!
OU Geosciences undergraduate Macie Menard and Colby Higdon (both advised @leptaena.bsky.social) presented at the department's annual Student Research Symposium and Expo. Both projects were made possible via the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History's Invertebrate Paleontology collections. Great job!
Happy #FossilFriday! from Anticosti Island, Quebec 🌊🪨 There’s nothing quite like the thrill of fieldwork—when someone shouts “Oh! Come look at this!” and the whole team gathers around to see what ancient story the rocks are about to reveal. #AnticostiIsland #CanadianFossils
A fossil crinoid from the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History (OU 99448) graces the cover of the new issue of the @paleosoc.bsky.social's Journal of Paleontology!
As the end of the year approaches, we're pleased to announce the OU Invert Paleo group at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History documented and described 33 new species in 2025, including fossil crinoid echinoderms, brachiopods, and snails
Helicoplacoid in a Santa hat and fossil friends wish you a very merry Christmas from the Cambrian mat grounds!
As the end of the year approaches, we're pleased to announce the OU Invert Paleo group at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History documented and described 33 new species in 2025, including fossil crinoid echinoderms, brachiopods, and snails
Assessing the impact of character evolution models on phylogenetic and macroevolutionary inferences from fossil data onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... @daveyfwright.bsky.social @datadryad.bsky.social
Many thanks to @astigall.bsky.social for coming to OU last week to give an awesome colloquium talk & visit the Sam Noble Museum! It was a semester highlight for us in @oupaleobiology.bsky.social and (as always) it was super great to catch up and chat science with one of my favorite paleontologists!
🚨New paper out in Palaeontology! Check it out if you're interested morphological evolution, fossil phylogenetics, and macroevolution 🧪 "Assessing the impact of character evolution models on phylogenetic and macroevolutionary inferences from fossil data"
Assessing the impact of character evolution models on phylogenetic and macroevolutionary inferences from fossil data
Understanding the evolution and phylogenetic distribution of morphologic traits is fundamental to macroevolutionary research. Despite decades of major advances and key insights from molecular systema...
dx.doi.org