October, 2014 | Everything Dinosaur Blog

4 10, 2014

Extensive Dinosaur Bonebed Discovered in Northern Mexico

By Mike|2023-03-16T17:05:04+00:00October 4th, 2014|Dinosaur and Prehistoric Animal News Stories, Dinosaur Fans|1 Comment

Joint Mexican and German Field Team Discover Extensive Dinosaur Remains in Chihuahua Desert

The Chihuahua Desert covers much of northern Mexico and stretches across the border into the United States. At around 160,000 square miles it is the second biggest desert in North America, the United Kingdom would fit into this semi-arid and true desert habitat one and a half times. This vast area is widely recognised as supporting one of the most diverse and speciose desert ecosystems on Earth, it is ironic then to report that a team of palaeontologists have discovered a site in the Chihuahua Desert that might represent one of the most concentrated areas of Late Cretaceous dinosaur bones anywhere in the world.

Large Fossil Discovery

Mapping and Recording Fossil Evidence

A dinosaur bonebed.

Picture credit: Reuters

A field research team exploring Upper Cretaceous strata have reportedly found the remains of at least fourteen dinosaurs on a site measuring fifty by two hundred metres. Such concentrations of prehistoric animal bones although rare, have been found elsewhere in North America, perhaps most famously in Canada where a number of single species ceratopsian bone beds have been excavated, but we at Everything Dinosaur are unaware of such a concentration in Mexico.

Dinosaur Bonebed

The research team consists of scientists from the University of Heidelberg, the State Museum of Natural History in Karlsruhe and the Desert Museum in Saltillo (30 miles south-west of Monterrey, Mexico). Although there has been no data published as yet confirming the identity of these animals to the genus level, we suspect that much of the material may represent fossils of duck-billed dinosaurs. In a statement, reported in a German newspaper, the field team have announced the discovery of at least fifteen more specimens at a nearby location, just a few miles away from the concentration.

Both sites represent riverine deposits and along with the fifteen other, more scattered specimens, the scientists have found fossils of turtles, small crocodilians and the teeth of a number of Cretaceous mammals.

An Extensive Floodplain

During the Late Cretaceous much of northern Mexico was an extensive flood plain and low lying coastal area with the Western Interior Seaway to the east and the Atlantic Ocean to the south. This landmass formed part of the southern provinces of the island continent of Laramidia which stretched from Mexico in the south up to the northern tip of Alaska.

A Bone Bed Containing Extensive Fossil Remains

A map showing the distribution of fossil material in an Edmontosaurus bonebed.

A map showing typical disarticulated fossil bone distribution in a bonebed.

Picture credit: Syndar et al (PLoS One)

Dinosaur Bonebeds

To read about the discovery of a huge dinosaur “graveyard” in Switzerland: Dinosaur “Graveyard” Discovered.

Commenting on the on-going field work, palaeontologist Eberhard Frey (State Museum of Natural History in Karlsruhe) said:

“There is a huge delta here with several rivers flowing into the Gulf of Mexico. This was a very active ecosystem. We have not only found dinosaur bones, but also four different species of turtle, remains of very small crocodiles and the teeth of early mammals”.

Trace fossils have also been found in the area including some three-toed footprints indicating the presence of a large theropod dinosaur in the locality.

Außerplanmäßiger Professor Frey added:

“This week we have found three teeth of theropods. These are diagnostic features that allow us to determine the species more precisely.”

More Information to be Published Next Year

An Everything Dinosaur team member stated that it was likely that more information about the fossils will be published next year as the field team expected to return to the excavation site in 2015 to further map the area, remove more fossil material and examine the surrounding area.

Scientists have learned a great deal about the flora and fauna of the this part of the continent of Laramidia in recent years. It was just six years ago that scientists, including researchers from the Desert Museum in Saltillo published a paper on the first, unique dinosaur genus to have been identified in Mexico.

To read more about this research: Viva Mexico! New Species of Duck-Billed Dinosaur Described.

Last week, a new species of armoured dinosaur (Ziapelta sanjuanensis) was announced. The fossils of this plant-eating member of the Ankylosauridae family were discovered across the border in the southern United States (New Mexico)

To read more about this fossil find: New Armoured Dinosaur from New Mexico.

3 10, 2014

Year 2 Dinosaur Workshop Extension

By Mike|2023-09-03T09:11:04+01:00October 3rd, 2014|Educational Activities, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Teaching|0 Comments

St Joseph and St Bede R.C. Primary make Dinosaur Video

Year 2 under the supervision of their enthusiastic teachers made a comic strip and video presentation after a visit by Everything Dinosaur. Our team members had conducted a dinosaur workshop with the class back in September and as part of a planned extension activity we had pretended to leave a clutch of dinosaur eggs behind for the schoolchildren to discover and then look after.

Dinosaur Video

The children asked if they could look after the eggs and we agreed. However, disaster has struck, one of the eggs has hatched and a baby dinosaur has escaped.

St Joseph and St Bede Primary School Children Make a Video

Picture credit: St Joseph and St Bede R.C. Primary School

We think the baby dinosaur is going to be all right. It was spotted on the school’s CCTV climbing out of a window and heading off out of the school gates to start a “dinosaur adventure”. We provide lots of extension activities and support to schools when we conduct dinosaur and fossil workshops in schools.

Visit the Everything Dinosaur website: Everything Dinosaur.

Dinosaur Soft Toys

One of the suggestions we have made, is for the dinosaur to be pictured (photoshop comes in very handy), at a number of famous landmarks. The “Cretaceous critter” can then send the class postcards and emails all about where it has been and what it has done. The children can plot the dinosaur’s travels on a map (great for helping with geography lessons). They can also write back to the dinosaur, which in itself is a great lesson plan for a creative writing session.

Where has our Baby Dinosaur Got To?

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Congratulations to the school children and the teaching team for making such a super video.

Everything Dinosaur team members used a soft toy dinosaur to help develop this lesson plan, to view the range of dinosaur soft toys available at Everything Dinosaur: Dinosaur Soft Toys.

3 10, 2014

Year 2 – Dinosaur Workshop Extension Idea

By Mike|2023-03-16T17:01:07+00:00October 3rd, 2014|Key Stage 1/2|Comments Off on Year 2 – Dinosaur Workshop Extension Idea

St Joseph and St Bede R. C. Primary Explore Dinosaurs

As a term topic, studying dinosaurs at Key Stage 1 lends itself to all kinds of imaginative and creative learning activities. The teaching team for Year 2 at St Joseph and St Bede R. C. Primary school have provided an example of this with an extension activity organised in co-operation with Everything Dinosaur team members following our visit to the school.

Dinosaur Workshop

During the dinosaur workshop we explained that as far as we know, all dinosaurs hatched from eggs. Working in collaboration with the Year 2 teachers, we pretended to have left behind some dinosaur eggs after we had finished packing up our fossils and other equipment. The children wrote informing us about the eggs (helpful exercise regarding sentence construction, spelling, format of letter and so forth), we agreed that it would be a good idea if they looked after the eggs for us.

Disaster has struck! Earlier this week the children discovered that an egg had hatched and that the baby dinosaur had disappeared. The pupils then created their own comic strips all about their “Dinosaur Disaster”.

Dinosaur Disaster at Primary School

Picture credit: Year 2 St Joseph and St Bede Primary School

This is a great example of an extension activity. The children are encouraged to investigate, explore ideas and to use different media to tell a story. We suspect that the school’s baby dinosaur is going to have lots of adventures and thanks to photoshop, it is going to turn up in some amazing parts of the world. Postcards sent to the school by the dinosaur will then act as a catalyst to introduce other subject areas into the scheme of work.

Visit Everything Dinosaur’s user friendly website: Visit Everything Dinosaur.

2 10, 2014

Evolution of Dinosaur Arms into Bird Wings

By Mike|2023-03-16T16:59:15+00:00October 2nd, 2014|Key Stage 3/4|Comments Off on Evolution of Dinosaur Arms into Bird Wings

Scientists Demonstrate how Dinosaur Arms Evolved into the Wings of Birds

A team of researchers based at the University of Chile (Santiago, Chile) have resolved a mystery surrounding one of the anatomical puzzles related to the theory that birds are descended from meat-eating dinosaurs. Whilst it is now widely accepted that modern birds are descended from a group of dinosaurs called the theropods, the wrist bones of many dinosaurs including members of the Theropoda are very different from the wrist bones of birds. Many types of early dinosaur had nine wrist bones, birds today, only have four. Can the theory of evolution explain these changes?

Robust, Strong Immobile Wrists of Dinosaurs Versus the Hyper-flexible Wrist of Aves

The dinosaurs which are most closely related to modern birds walked on their hind feet. Their forelimbs were not involved in locomotion. They became adapted for a number of functions, primarily related to food gathering. Most of the theropod dinosaurs were meat-eaters. The wrist evolved as a relatively strong and immobile joint to help subdue prey or to assist in attacking other animals.

The wrist joint in birds helps to manage the forces involved in the movements of the wing in flight. They also permit the wings to be folded back when the bird is not flying, so how the wrist bones of dinosaurs evolved into the specialised and highly modified wrist bones of birds has been the subject of much debate.

The Evolution of Dinosaurs to Birds

The evolution of a wrist bone adapted to flight.

Picture credit: Davide Bonnadonna.

Two Distinct Research Techniques

The University of Chile team, published a paper in October 2014, that used two distinct research techniques to help solve the mystery of why dinosaur wrist bones are very different from the wrist bones of birds.

Technique 1 – staining proteins in the developing embryos of extant birds and reptiles to see how the wrist bones are formed
Technique 2 – studying the fossilised wrist bones from dinosaurs and extinct birds

Mapping Evolutionary Changes

The scientists were able to map evolutionary changes in the Dinosauria and primitive birds that showed how wrist bones evolved over time to resemble those bones found in birds. The embryo studies, using the newly developed technique of whole-mount immunostaining, showed that one of the wrist bones found in birds, the semilunate had actually formed from two fused dinosaur bones (distal carpal 1 and distal carpal 2).

Mapping the Evolution of Bones in the Wrist (Dinosaurs to Birds)

From dinosaur wrist bones to the wrist bones of birds.

Picture credit: PLOS Biology

The above chart shows the phylogenetic relationship diagram that helps explain how dinosaur wrist bones evolved eventually into the four, square-shaped bones found in the wrist of a modern bird (chicken). The coloured bones relate to bones found in modern birds.

Dinosaur Arms

The Early Jurassic dinosaur called Heterodontosaurus, is believed not to be very closely related to modern birds. Heterodontosaurus was an ornithopod, not a theropod. It had a total of nine bones in its wrist.

There are some similarities between this dinosaur and the wrists of birds, but Heterodontosaurus may also have used its forelimbs for walking. Coelophysis from the Triassic was a theropod and therefore more closely related to birds. This dinosaur was very probably entirely bipedal. Note in the evolutionary diagram above, the presence of a small red bone located close to the ulna arm bone in both Heterodontosaurus and Coelophysis. This is the pisiform bone, a pea-shaped bone found in birds but not in later theropod dinosaurs such as Allosaurus, Guanlong, Deinonychus and Yixianosaurus.

An Illustration of Coelophysis (Scale Drawing)

A scale drawing of the Triassic dinosaur Coelophysis.

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

The South American research team discovered that some bones in the wrist of dinosaurs were lost, some fused to form a single bone as seen in birds today and the pisiform, once lost in the Dinosauria, re-evolved as the wrist became adapted to accommodate the forces associated with powered flight.

A New Research Technique

The newly developed technique of whole-mount immunostaining permitted the research team to see how proteins grouped together in embryonic birds to form cartilage that later became bone. The semilunate bone (yellow and green in the diagram) starts of as two separate areas of cartilage in the embryo which then fuse to form a single bone. Palaeontologists have long believed that that semilunate bone is a fusing of two wrist bones from the ancestral dinosaurs (distal carpal 1 and distal carpal 2), this new research seems to support this theory.

The study also produced an interesting surprise, when they discovered a wrist bone called the pisiform (in red in the diagram), which was present in the ornithopod Heterodontosaurus and primitive theropods but later disappeared in more advanced theropods from the Jurassic and Cretaceous.

Commenting on this discovery, lead author of the research paper, Dr Alexander Vargas stated:

“We think the pisiform was lost when dinosaurs became bipedal. Quadrupedal animals used this bone because they walk with their forelimbs, but bipedal dinosaurs no longer walked with their forelimbs and lost the bone. However they regained it when they began using their forelimbs for locomotion in flight.”

Mapping Proteins

New techniques such as the mapping of proteins in embryos using whole-mount immunostaining demonstrates an evolutionary lineage from those theropod dinosaurs most closely related to birds and the four wrist bones found today in modern birds.

Extension Ideas Key Stage 3 Evolution (Birds Evolved from Dinosaurs)

Have the class gather together pictures of birds and illustrations of dinosaurs – what anatomical similarities are there – scales on feet, feathers, three-toes, claws etc.
Examine pictures of dinosaur (Theropoda) skeletons and the skeletons of extant Aves – what anatomical similarities can now be seen – wish bones, claws, limb bone assemblage etc.
Using information related to the discovery of Archaeopteryx, what does this state about dinosaur/bird evolution?

2 10, 2014

From Dinosaur Arms to the Wings of Birds

By Mike|2023-03-16T16:42:48+00:00October 2nd, 2014|Dinosaur Fans, Main Page, Palaeontological articles|0 Comments

New Study Helps to Explain How Dinosaurs Got their Wings

Most scientists now agree the feathers originated in the Dinosauria and that Aves (birds) are descendants from a group of bipedal, very bird-like dinosaurs that make up a portion of a larger group of dinosaurs known as the Theropoda. In essence, the birds we know today evolved from dinosaurs (specifically the Maniraptora). However, despite a lot of fossil evidence to indicate that the birds are closely related to and descended from the Dinosauria there have been one or two areas that have led to some confusion.

Take for example, the wrist bones.

Dinosaurs

The numerous wrist bones in dinosaurs and their relatively immobile wrists evolved over time into the highly flexible wrists with fewer bones that scientists see today in living birds. The wrist bones in birds helps to manage the forces involved in the movements of the wing in flight. They also permit the wings to be folded back when the bird is not flying, so how the wrist bones of dinosaurs evolved into the specialised and highly modified wrist bones of birds has been the subject of much debate.

The Evolution of a Wrist Designed for a Wing

The evolution of a wrist bone adapted to flight.

Picture credit: Davide Bonadonna

A new study by a team of scientists based at the Universidae de Chile (University of Chile), Santiago, Chile and published in the academic journal PLOS Biology may have solved this palaeontological puzzle.

Nine into Four Does Go

Let’s start with a very simple explanation of the problem. Scientists studying living species, in this case birds and specifically ducks, chickens, lapwings, finches and budgerigars that were used in this study, can examine in minute detail the living organism. They can also study embryos to see how the bones in the wrist are formed. The scientists can also study the wrist bones and embryos of reptiles such as caiman to provide data on the wrist bones and embryonic growth of other types of archosaurs.

The Archosauria

The Archosauria is the division of Reptilia that contains the dinosaurs and crocodiles, it is from the archosaurs that the birds evolved. These scientists can see how the anatomy of an animal develops. Techniques such as cell and molecular biology studies can reveal all sorts of information with regards to how the wrists of extant (living organisms) form. Palaeontologists, on the other hand, (no pun intended) only have a very incomplete fossil record to study. So scientists are using different data sources to study wrist bone evolution.

Research to help identify the wrist bones in dinosaurs and the corresponding bones in the wrists of birds draws data from two radically different sources:

cell biology, extant organisms and embryology
fossils of birds, fossils of dinosaurs, studies of the bones of extinct animals

This new study shows how the modern bird wrist with its four bones, arranged in an approximate square shape corresponds to the nine bones found in non-avian dinosaurs. The team have looked at how dinosaur wrists evolved and report on previously undetected evolutionary processes including loss, fusion and in one case, a re-evolution of a bone once lost in the Dinosauria.

A Critical Advance in Understanding

This new study effectively combined these two areas of research. The laboratory run by Alexander Vargas (University of Chile) and lead author of the study, developed a new method of looking at specific proteins in the embryos and produced three-dimensional maps to demonstrate how the wrist bones formed. This new method has been named whole-mount immunostaining. It allows scientists to observe skeletal development in embryos much better than before. At the same time, the research team re-examined the fossils of dinosaurs and prehistoric birds in a bid to tie the two strands of research together.

The Semilunate Bone

Back in the 1960s the palaeontologist John Ostrom, re-ignited the bird/dinosaurs debate by proposing that fearsome, sickle-clawed predators such as Deinonychus (D. antirrhopus) were agile, active animals and very bird-like. He proposed that the semilunate bone, one of the four bones making up the square-shaped arrangement of bones in a modern bird’s wrist had actually formed from the fusing of two bones present in dinosaur fossils, such as those bones found in the wrists of dinosaurs like Deinonychus and its relatives. This new technique, confirms that Ostrom was right.

Deinonychus Part of the Dinosaurs to Birds Story

A fearsome Deinonychus dinosaur

Picture credit: Everything Dinosaur

Whole-mount immunostaining and the mapping of cartilage formation and proteins in the embryos of birds, allowed the scientists to confirm that the semilunate in Aves does form from as two separate cartilages which fuse and ossify into a single bone, proving that Ostrom was very probably on the right track nearly fifty years ago.

Dr Vargas explained:

“These findings eliminate persistent doubts that existed over exactly how the bones of the wrist evolved and iron out arguments about wrist development being incompatible with birds originating from dinosaurs.”

This research has helped scientists to work out how the nine bones found in the wrists of some theropod dinosaurs gradually evolved into the four bones seen in modern birds. In addition, this study produced a surprise, a result that was not expected. A small bone present in the wrists of a group of dinosaurs known as the Sauropoda, disappeared in the bipedal theropods, but re-evolved when some theropods began to fly.

Sauropods and Theropods are Closely Related

Sauropods and theropod dinosaurs are closely related. They represent the two types of dinosaur that make up the Saurischia (lizard-hipped dinosaurs). Sauropods walked on all fours and had a small bone in their wrist called the pisiform that had a function in their four-legged, quadrupedal stance. Theropod dinosaurs were essentially bipeds (walking on their hind limbs). The arms of these dinosaurs were no longer used for walking but for catching and subduing prey.

Over millions of years the pisiform bone was lost from the wrists of the two-legged theropods. However, the authors of this study discovered that the pisiform had reappeared in early birds, probably as an adaptation for flight, where this small wrist bone permits the transmission of force on the down-stroke of a wing beat whilst restricting flexibility on the up-stroke phase of a wing beat.

The Evolution of the Wrist from Dinosaurs to Birds

From dinosaurs to birds ( Dinosauria – Theropoda – Maniraptora – Aves)

Picture credit: PLOS Biology

The chart shows the colour coded bones and how they changed over time. For example, the pisiform bone (red) can be found in the Early Jurassic ornithopod Heterodontosaurus (not a theropod) and in the Late Triassic theropod Coelophysis. This bone is lost in later theropods such as Allosaurus and Guanlong but evolves again in primitive birds such as Sapeornis. Sapeornis was about the size of a seagull, it seems to have been a strong flyer. It lived during the Early Cretaceous.

The colour coded chart also shows how the square-shaped arrangement of bones in a modern bird such as the chicken evolved, with the fusion of the distal carpal 1 and the distal carpal 2 bones (yellow and green). In the maniraptoran Falcarius, a member of the Therizinosauroidea and not a direct ancestor of birds, these two bones are distinct. However, in those maniraptorans believed to be more closely related to the birds, indeed, the ancestors of Aves, dinosaurs such as Khaan, Deinonychus and Yixianosaurus these two carpals become fused to form the semilunate found in the wrists of modern birds.

1 10, 2014

WIN, WIN with Everything Dinosaur

By Mike|2023-03-16T16:22:14+00:00October 1st, 2014|Dinosaur Fans, Everything Dinosaur News and Updates, Main Page, Press Releases|14 Comments

Competition Time Again with Everything Dinosaur (Competition Closed)

It’s competition time again with Everything Dinosaur and we have a signed copy of a fantastic new book all about British dinosaurs to win. To celebrate the publication of “Dinosaurs of the British Isles” one of the authors of this amazing account about all things Dinosauria, palaeontologist Dean Lomax, has autographed a copy from the very first print run. Everything Dinosaur is going to give this away to one lucky dinosaur fan.

For dinosaur models and figures: Dinosaur Figures and Models.

Everything Dinosaur

Please Note – this competition is now closed.

The Front Cover of “Dinosaurs of the British Isles”

*A comprehensive guide to British dinosaurs over 400 pages.*

Picture credit: Siri Scientific Press

“Dinosaurs of the British Isles”

This unique publication catalogues all the major dinosaur fossil discoveries from the British Isles. With a foreward from Dr Paul Barrett of the Natural History Museum, Dean and his fellow author Nobumichi Tamura provide a comprehensive account on the dinosaurs of the entire British Isles. With hundreds of photographs, detailed skeletal reconstructions and vivid life illustrations this is a “must have” for every dedicated dinosaur fan, fossil collector and budding palaeontologist.

Competition Details

So our competition is this, if you were to discover a new species of dinosaur in the UK – what name would you call it? That’s right, we want you to come up with a name for a new species of British dinosaur!

To enter our “name a British dinosaur” competition, a chance to win this truly unique account of the dinosaurs of the British Isles, all you have to do is “Like” Everything Dinosaur’s FACEBOOK page, then leave a comment with your suggested name for a new British dinosaur on the picture of the front cover of the book (shown above).

Click the logo to visit our Facebook page and to give our page a “like”.

Everything Dinosaur on FACEBOOK: “LIKE” Our Facebook Page and Enter Competition.

We will draw the lucky winner at random and the British dinosaur name competition closes on Friday, 31st October 2014. Good luck to everyone and we can’t wait to see what British dinosaur names you come up!

Terms and Conditions of Name a British Dinosaur Competition

Automated entries are not permitted and will be excluded from the draw.

Only one entry per person.

The prize is non-transferable and no cash alternative will be offered.

The Everything Dinosaur name a British dinosaur competition runs until Friday, October 31st 2014.

Winner will be notified by private message on Facebook or email.

Prize includes postage and packing.

For full terms and conditions contact: Email Everything Dinosaur.

To read Everything Dinosaur’s Review of “Dinosaurs of the British Isles”: “Dinosaurs of the British Isles”. Reviewed.

Can’t wait to get hold of this book! “Dinosaurs of the British Isles” can be ordered from Siri Scientific Press: Siri Scientific Press.

PLEASE NOTE THIS COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED