Michael Deak
@slothfultyrant.bsky.social
Adjunct professor at Youngstown State University who specializes in theropod and sloth thermoregulation and integument. He/Him, all opinions are my own.
The evolution of the ‘third eye’ illuminates shifting amniote ecologies through the Late Paleozoic and Triassic royalsocietypublishing.org/rsos/article...
The evolution of the ‘third eye’ illuminates shifting amniote ecologies through the Late Paleozoic and Triassic
Abstract. The pineal gland has strong ties to organismal physiology and behaviour, and in several ectothermic clades of tetrapods, it is associated with an
royalsocietypublishing.org
This man brought Stan and Steely Dan together. RIP.
Professor John R. Hutchinson@johnrhutchinson.bsky.social · last wk.Bummer. Bill Oddie was a solid presenter for natural history documentaries. RIP. I worked with him on "The Truth About Killer Dinosaurs" (terrible title, decent show) soon after I moved to the UK, 2005. He came to our lab and filmed with an ostrich on a treadmill. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
In other news: Foraminal widening indicating a spinal nerve tumor in the saber-tooth cat Smilodon fatalis from Rancho La Brea www.frontiersin.org/journals/vet...
Frontiers | Foraminal widening indicating a spinal nerve tumor in the saber-tooth cat Smilodon fatalis from Rancho La Brea
Tracing the health of extinct populations is important. Documenting this in deep time is challenging, but skeletal markers of disease can be preserved in fos...
frontiersin.org
To quote a recent episode of Terrible Lizards: Tim Haines: "Have you seen what AI does now?...I'm sure Dave you've seen it, it's beautiful work being done by just individuals with cleaning at home, and I'm thinking...." @davehone.bsky.social: "I've some absolutely abysmal stuff."
DinoCon@dinoconuk.bsky.social · last wk.
Thinkin about lizard belly buttons. Baby lizards connect to their yolk sacs through a tube like baby humans connect to a placenta. Unlike humans, the mark where the tube used to be isn’t permanent and will disappear by adulthood. 📷Northern Exotics
Fossil science geeks: my buddy Tom Kaye just published a paper about using laser induced fluorescence to figure out the trace elements in fossils. So now analysis can be done without destructive testing! Link to paper: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
A lovely moment for your Monday: mud-rolling Javan rhino: www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGf3...
Rare Javan Rhino Rolling in the Mud
YouTube video by IntlRhinoFoundation
youtube.com
Our ground sloth paper made it into a @pbseons.bsky.social video!!!!! youtu.be/Cjrt7qlGhl8?...
Why Humanity Has Amnesia About Giant Sloths
YouTube video by PBS Eons
youtu.be
More support for ancient archosaurs possessing lips! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....
Inferred presence of extraoral tissues in Triassic archosauromorphs and the evolutionary implications for the clade Sauropsida
Recent work has suggested that the presence of extraoral soft tissues (‘lips’), in the form of labial scales in theropod dinosaurs, could be inferred based on: anteroposteriorly distributed foramina ....
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
Juvenile Stephanorhinus hemitoechus observing a dragonfly.
Happy Birthday Mary Anning 🦑 A pioneer. Without formal education. From working class background. Becoming breadwinner at a young age. Reshaped how we see the world. Now, globally recognised as the lady that started it all. Thank you, Mary, you're an inspiration.
Drivers and mechanisms of convergent forelimb reduction in non-avian theropod dinosaurs royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article...
Drivers and mechanisms of convergent forelimb reduction in non-avian theropod dinosaurs
Abstract. Forelimb reduction has been observed in numerous and disparate non-avian theropod dinosaurs, resulting in the hypothesis that reduced forelimbs e
royalsocietypublishing.org
Commencement speakers praising AI and getting booed is becoming a genre, and I’m here for it.
404 Media@404media.co · 3mo agoFormer Google CEO Eric Schmidt was booed throughout this commencement speech at the University of Arizona for his praise of AI. This comes just a week after another commencement speaker who mentioned AI was booed at a school in Florida. Read more: www.404media.co/ucf-ai-comme...
The most thoughtful piece on this that I have read so far
Michael Le Page@mjflepage.bsky.social · 3mo agoColossal says its "artificial egg" will help it bring back the moa, which had larger eggs than any living birds 🧪 But it's really just an artificial eggshell, and even clingfilm will work - sort of - as an artificial eggshell. Plus there's the yolk problem... www.newscientist.com/article/2527...
My new short film Jurassic Ward is out!! I had a lot of fun working on this, I hope y’all have as much fun watching it as I did making it!
Amber Bellomio@digitalduck.bsky.social · 3mo ago"...if you can eat grass you can handle almost any other type of vegetation. This opened a variety of habitats to #mammoths, & so we find their fossils in almost every #Pleistocene habitat in southern California..."🦣 - Dr. Alton Dooley Jr life-from-a-certain-point-of-view.ghost.io/mammoths-in-...
Mammoths in the Desert
Western Science Center serves as a fossil repository for several state and federal agencies, including the National Park Service. Related to that responsibility, a couple of times a year we send a tea...
life-from-a-certain-point-of-view.ghost.io
Happy centennial to the legendary Sir David Attenborough. Out of my favorite Attenborough moments, this one is in the top three easily. It never gets old seeing the superb lyrebird pulling off these vocalizations! www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSB7...
Attenborough: the amazing Lyre Bird sings like a chainsaw! Now in high quality | BBC Earth
YouTube video by BBC Earth
youtube.com
New Art! "Firecracker" Nanotyrannus lethaeus. #paleoart #prehistory #prehistoricplanet #dinosaur #dinosaurart #sciart #tyrannosaur #nanotyrannus #art
The KSL also reported on our recent work published in @commsbio.bsky.social and what Misha can teach us about forensics and paleoecology: kslnewsradio.com/utah/misha-h... Our original paper: www.nature.com/articles/s42...
Strontium isotope mapping of elephant enamel supports an integrated microsampling-modeling workflow to reconstruct herbivore migrations - Communications Biology
Comparisons of 87Sr/86Sr data from the tusk and molar enamel of a zoo elephant suggest that a microsampling-modeling workflow is the best practice strategy for geospatial reconstructions of seasonal m...
nature.com
