When you think 3D you probably imagine the cinema and popcorn, or that fancy TV you’ve just blown the kids’ university fees on. What you probably don’t think - unless you’re a particular breed of palaeontologist…
The linear nature of global warming trends projected by the IPCC since 1990 and as late as 2007 (see Figure 1) has given the public and policy makers an impression there is plenty of time for economies…
Mark Twain reputedly said it wasn’t what he didn’t know that bothered him, but what he knew that wasn’t true. A recent contribution on dinosaur physiology in Nature, by palaeontologist Meike Köhler and…
Dinosaur remains have been found on every continent on Earth and we know these creatures dominated the planet’s ecosystems for around 140 million years. But despite their abundance elsewhere, few discoveries…
Palaeontology has gone high-tech: no more wax and plaster-cast models. Instead, 3D data from computed tomography (CT) scans is overturning long-held views of how the earliest land animals moved. Research…
A newly discovered species of feathered tyrannosaurus, Yutyrannus huali, grew up to 9 metres in length and weighed about 1400 kg, making it 40 times heavier than the largest previously known feathered…
Why have mass extinctions of species occurred since the late Proterozoic (from 580 million years ago) and repeatedly through the Phanerozoic? Integral to these extinctions were abrupt changes in the physical…
DURBAN CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE: Do the 10,000 or so delegates at Durban, and those whom they represent, fully accept that their mission constitutes no less than an attempt to reverse the suicidal course…
When we think of the last 50,000 years of prehistory, particularly the “Ice Age”, extinct species such as the woolly mammoth and woolly rhinoceros often spring to mind. Did humans bring about the extinction…
The harsh, flat, ancient, vastness of Australia is an unforgiving place for palaentologists. The pickings can be much richer in more mountainous and rocky regions of the world, a difference highlighted…
Palaeontologists have discovered a 780,000 year old bird fossil, thought to be a type of ancient wedge-tailed eagle, in a Western Australian cave that has trapped birds for millions of years. The eagle…