Science Daily - Dinosaurs

Palaeontologists have analyzed the most complete stegosaurian skull ever found in Europe and rewritten the evolutionary history of this iconic group of dinosaurs.

Contrary to widespread assumptions, the largest shark that ever lived -- Otodus megalodon -- fed on marine creatures at various levels of the food pyramid and not just the top. Scientists analyzed the zinc content of a large sample of fossilized megalodon teeth, which had been unearthed above all in Sigmaringen and Passau, and compared them with fossil teeth found elsewhere and the teeth of animals that inhabit our planet today.

A group of fossils of elasmosaurs -- some of the most famous in North America -- have just been formally identified as belonging to a 'very odd' new genus of the sea monster, unlike any previously known. This primitive 85-million-year-old, 12 meter-long, fiercely predatory marine reptile is unlike any elasmosaur known to-date and hunted its prey from above.

New research shows that dentine, the inner layer of teeth that transmits sensory information to nerves inside the pulp, first evolved as sensory tissue in the armored exoskeletons of ancient fish.

A dinosaur's 40-second journey more than 120 million years ago has been brought back to life by a research team using advanced digital modelling techniques.

Scientists have found new evidence for how our fossil human relatives in South Africa may have used their hands. Researchers investigated variation in finger bone morphology to determine that South African hominins not only may have had different levels of dexterity, but also different climbing abilities.

The origin of reptiles on Earth has been shown to be up to 40 million years earlier than previously thought -- thanks to evidence discovered at an Australian fossil site that represents a critical time period. Scientists have identified fossilized tracks of an amniote with clawed feet -- most probably a reptile -- from the Carboniferous period, about 350 million years ago.

Scientists have now discovered the oldest ancestor for all the Australian tree frogs, with distant links to the tree frogs of South America.

Archaeopteryx is the fossil that clearly demonstrated Darwin's views. It's the oldest known fossil bird, and it helps show that all birds -- including the ones alive today -- emerged from dinosaurs. And while the first Archaeopteryx fossil was found more than 160 years ago, scientists are continuing to learn new things about this ancient animal. A set of feathers never before seen in this species help explain why it could fly when many of its non-bird dinosaur cousins could not.

Originally from South America, the charismatic tegu made its way to the United States via the pet trade of the 1990s. But a recent discovery shows these reptiles are no strangers to the region -- tegus were here millions of years before their modern relatives arrived in pet carriers.

The Arctic landscape during the Cretaceous Period may have been dominated by the dinosaurs, but the rivers and streams held something more familiar. Alaska's fresh waters 73 million years ago were teeming with the ancient relatives of today's salmon, pike and other northern fish. A new article has named three new species of fish from that time period, including a salmonid, dubbed Sivulliusalmo alaskensis.

Tyrannosaurus rex evolved in North America, but its direct ancestor came from Asia, crossing a land bridge connecting the continents more than 70 million years ago, according to a new study.

A new study is reshaping how scientists date dinosaur fossils in Alberta's Dinosaur Provincial Park (DPP). Using advanced drone-assisted 3D mapping, researchers have uncovered significant variations in a key geological marker, challenging long-standing methods of determining the ages of dinosaur fossils.

A new study links fossilized flying reptile tracks to animals that made them. Fossilized footprints reveal a 160-million-year-old invasion as pterosaurs came down from the trees and onto the ground. Tracks of giant ground-stalkers, comb-jawed coastal waders, and specialized shell crushers, shed light on how pterosaurs lived, moved, and evolved.

Imagine a crocodile built like a greyhound -- that's a sebecid. Standing tall, with some species reaching 20 feet in length, they dominated South American landscapes after the extinction of dinosaurs until about 11 million years ago. Or at least, that's what paleontologists thought. A new study shows the Caribbean Islands were a refuge for the last sebecid populations at least 5 million years after they went extinct everywhere else.

New research questions the evolutionary history of some of our most peculiar mammals.

Researchers examined teeth and skulls of 99 extinct crocodylomorph species and 20 living crocodylian species to reconstruct their dietary ecology and identify characteristics that helped some groups persist through two mass extinctions. They discovered that one secret tocrocodylian longevity is their remarkably flexible lifestyles, both in what they eat and the habitat in which they get it.

Footprints of armored dinosaurs with tail clubs have been identified, following discoveries made in the Canadian Rockies. The 100-million-year-old fossilized footprints were found at sites at both Tumbler Ridge, BC, and northwestern Alberta.

Rhinos that flourished across much of North America 12 million years ago gathered in huge herds, according to a new study.

The idea that dinosaurs were already in decline before an asteroid wiped most of them out 66 million years ago may be explained by a worsening fossil record from that time rather than a genuine dwindling of dinosaur species, suggests a new study.