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Categories: Paleontology: Climate, Paleontology: Dinosaurs
Published What the inner ear of Europasaurus reveals about its life
(via sciencedaily.com) Europasaurus is a long-necked, herbivorous dinosaur that lived in the Late Jurassic, about 154 million years ago, on a small island in modern-day Germany. Recently, scientists examined fossil braincase material of Europasaurus with the aid of micro-computed tomography (micro-CT). The digital reconstruction of the inner ear of Europasaurus gave the researchers new insights not only into its hearing ability, but also into its reproductive and social behavior.
Published Early forests did not significantly change the atmospheric CO2
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists have discovered that the atmosphere contained far less CO2 than previously thought when forests emerged on our planet, the new study has important implications for understanding how land plants affect the climate.
Published New theory on timing for human settlement of some parts of tropical Pacific
(via sciencedaily.com) Spread across vast distances, the islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean are thought to have been populated by humans in two distinct migrations beginning approximately 3,330 years ago. The first followed a northern route out of what is today the Philippines and the second followed a southern route from Taiwan and New Guinea. People arrived on the islands between these routes -- now making up the Federated States of Micronesia -- about 1,000 years later. But a new finding by sea-level researchers suggests that the islands in Micronesia were possibly settled much earlier than supposed and that voyagers on the two routes may have interacted with one another.
Published Scientists discover what was on the menu of the first dinosaurs
(via sciencedaily.com) The earliest dinosaurs included carnivorous, omnivorous and herbivorous species, according to a team of palaeobiologists.
Published Linking fossil climate proxies to living bacteria helps climate predictions
(via sciencedaily.com) Fossilized microbial skins can give us a glimpse of how the climate was in the deep geological past. By discovering the 'missing link' between such fossil skins and the skins of living bacteria, researchers have greatly improved the accuracy of climate reconstructions and predictions.
Published Climate change played key role in dinosaur success story
(via sciencedaily.com) Climate change, rather than competition, played a key role in the ascendancy of dinosaurs through the Late Triassic and Early Jurassic periods.
Published Increasing forest cover in the Eifel region 11,000 years ago resulted in the local loss of megafauna
(via sciencedaily.com) Sediment cores obtained from Eifel maar sites provide insight into the presence of large Ice Age mammals in Central Europe over the past 60,000 years: Overkill hypothesis not confirmed. Herds of megafauna, such as mammoth and bison, have roamed the prehistoric plains in what is today's Central Europe for several tens of thousands of years. As woodland expanded at the end of the last Ice Age, the numbers of these animals declined and by roughly 11,000 years ago, they had completely vanished from this region. Thus, the growth of forests was the main factor that determined the extinction of such megafauna in Central Europe.
Published Changes in Earth's orbit may have triggered ancient warming event
(via sciencedaily.com) Changes in Earth's orbit that favored hotter conditions may have helped trigger a rapid global warming event 56 million years ago. Researchers found the shape of Earth's orbit, or eccentricity, and the wobble in its rotation, or precession, favored hotter conditions at the onset of the PETM and that these orbital configurations together may have played a role in triggering the event.
Published Assessing El Nino 'flavors' to unravel past variability, future impact
(via sciencedaily.com) By assessing so-called 'flavors' of El Nino events in past climate records and model simulations, researchers have a clearer picture of El Nino patterns over the past 12,000 years and are able to more accurately project future changes and impacts of this powerful force.
Published Dinosaur teeth reveal what they didn't eat
(via sciencedaily.com) Scratches on dinosaur teeth could reveal what they really ate. Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) has now been used to infer the feeding habits of large theropods, including Allosaurus and T. rex. By taking 3D images of individual teeth and analyzing the pattern of marks scratched into them, researchers could reason which dinosaurs may have frequently crunched on hard bone and which may have regularly eaten softer foods and prey. This technique opens up a new avenue of research for paleontology, helping us to better understand not only dinosaurs themselves but also the environment and communities in which they lived.
Published Climate whiplash increased wildfires on California's west coast about 8,000 years ago
(via sciencedaily.com) Researchers have been studying the effects of the sudden decrease in global temperatures that occurred about 8,200 years ago, the so-called 8.2-kiloyear event, with the help of mineral deposits present in White Moon Cave in Northern California. New indications show that oscillations between extreme wetness and aridity in California were closely linked with the occurrence of wildfires. The researchers have concluded that such events are likely to become more common in the face of human-induced climate change.
Published Climate archives under the magnifying glass
(via sciencedaily.com) How is the weather changing as a consequence of global warming? Climate archives provide valuable glimpses into past climate changes, especially into the processes that drive our planet from one climate setting to the next. For humans and ecosystems, however, time spans of just weeks to years, which are the scope of weather events, are often most important. Using an newly developed and tested analytical method these two aspects have now been merged, and the impacts of the most recent global warming on seasonal temperature fluctuations have been described.
Published Discovery of world's oldest DNA breaks record by one million years
(via sciencedaily.com) Two-million-year-old DNA has been identified -- opening a 'game-changing' new chapter in the history of evolution. Microscopic fragments of environmental DNA were found in Ice Age sediment in northern Greenland. Using cutting-edge technology, researchers discovered the fragments are one million years older than the previous record for DNA sampled from a Siberian mammoth bone. The ancient DNA has been used to map a two-million-year-old ecosystem which weathered extreme climate change.
Published Dinosaurs were on the up before asteroid downfall
(via sciencedaily.com) Dinosaurs dominated the world right up until a deadly asteroid hit the earth, leading to their mass extinction, some 66 million years ago, a landmark study reveals. Fresh insights into dinosaurs' ecosystems -- the habitats and food types that supported their lives -- suggests that their environments were robust and thriving, right up until that fateful day, at the end of the Cretaceous period.
Published Ankylosaurs battled each other as much as they fought off T. rex
(via sciencedaily.com) Scientists have found new evidence for how armored dinosaurs used their iconic tail clubs. The exceptional fossil of the ankylosaur Zuul crurivastator has spikes along its flanks that were broken and re-healed while the dinosaur was alive -- injuries that the scientists think were caused from a strike by another Zuul's massive tail club. This suggests ankylosaurs had complex behavior, possibly battling for social and territorial dominance or even engaging in a 'rutting' season for mates.
Published Fresh understanding of ice age frequency
(via sciencedaily.com) A chance find of an unstudied Antarctic sediment core has led researchers to flip our understanding of how often ice ages occurred in Antarctica.
Published The Southern Hemisphere is stormier than the Northern, and we finally know why
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source The Southern Hemisphere is stormier than the Northern -- but no one knew why. A new study lays out the first concrete explanation for this phenomenon. Researchers found two major culprits: ocean circulation and the large mountain ranges in the Northern Hemisphere.
Published Greenland ice sheet: Short-lived ice streams
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Major ice streams can shut down, shifting rapid ice transport to other parts of the ice sheet, within a few thousand years. This was determined in reconstructions of two ice streams, based on ice-penetrating radar scans of the Greenland ice sheet.
Published Complete picture of Arctic sea ice freeze-thaw cycle highlights sea ice response to climate change
(via sciencedaily.com) Years of research show that climate change signals are amplified in the Arctic, and that sea ice in this region is sensitive to increases in Arctic warming. Sea ice greatly modifies the exchanges of heat, momentum and mass between the atmosphere and the ocean. So, the timings of the sea ice melt and freeze onsets, as well as the length of the melt and freeze seasons, play a key role in the 'heat budget' of the atmosphere-ice-ocean system.
Published Old-growth trees more drought tolerant than younger ones, providing a buffer against climate change
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A new analysis of more than 20,000 trees on five continents shows that old-growth trees are more drought tolerant than younger trees in the forest canopy and may be better able to withstand future climate extremes. The findings highlight the importance of preserving the world's remaining old-growth forests, which are biodiversity strongholds that store vast amounts of planet-warming carbon, according to forest ecologists.