Credit: Dr. Huw Barton

Use of new analysis techniques provides food for thought about how people lived 5,000 years ago.

Archaeologists have made a discovery in southern subtropical China which could revolutionise thinking about how ancient humans lived in the region.

They have uncovered evidence for the first time that people living in Xincun 5,000 years ago may have practised agriculture –before the arrival of domesticated rice in the region.

Current archaeological thinking is that it was the advent of rice cultivation along the Lower Yangtze River that marked the beginning of agriculture in southern China. Poor organic preservation in the study region, as in many others, means that traditional archaeobotany techniques are not possible.

Xincun site under excavation a) Neolithic living surface under cleaning

Now, thanks to a new method of analysis on ancient grinding stones, the archaeologists have uncovered evidence that agriculture could predate the advent of rice in the region.

The research was the result of a two-year collaboration between Dr Huw Barton, from the School of Archaeology and Ancient History at the University of Leicester, and Dr Xiaoyan Yang, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Beijing.

Funded by a Royal Society UK-China NSFC International Joint Project, and other grants held by Yang in China, the research is published in PLOS ONE.

Dr Barton, Senior Lecturer in Bioarchaeology at the University of Leicester, described the find as ‘hitting the jackpot’: “Our discovery is totally unexpected and very exciting.

“We have used a relatively new method known as ancient starch analysis to analyse ancient human diet. This technique can tell us things about human diet in the past that no other method can.

“From a sample of grinding stones we extracted very small quantities of adhering sediment trapped in pits and cracks on the tool surface. From this material, preserved starch granules were extracted with our Chinese colleagues in the starch laboratory in Beijing. These samples were analysed in China and also here at Leicester in the Starch and Residue Laboratory, School of Archaeology and Ancient History.

“Our research shows us that there was something much more interesting going on in the subtropical south of China 5,000 years ago than we had first thought. The survival of organic material is really dependent on the particular chemical properties of the soil, so you never know what you will get until you sample. At Xincun we really hit the jackpot. Starch was well-preserved and there was plenty of it. While some of the starch granules we found were species we might expect to find on grinding and pounding stones, ie. some seeds and tuberous plants such as freshwater chestnuts, lotus root and the fern root, the addition of starch from palms was totally unexpected and very exciting.”

Several types of tropical palms store prodigious quantities of starch. This starch can be literally bashed and washed out of the trunk pith, dried as flour, and of course eaten. It is non-toxic, not particularly tasty, but it is reliable and can be processed all year round. Many communities in the tropics today, particularly in Borneo and Indonesia, but also in eastern India, still rely on flour derived from palms.

Dr Barton said: “The presence of at least two, possibly three species of starch producing palms, bananas, and various roots, raises the intriguing possibility that these plants may have been planted nearby the settlement.

“Today groups that rely on palms growing in the wild are highly mobile, moving from one palm stand to another as they exhaust the clump. Sedentary groups that utilise palms for their starch today, plant suckers nearby the village, thus maintaining continuous supply. If they were planted at Xincun, this implies that ‘agriculture’ did not arrive here with the arrival of domesticated rice, as archaeologists currently think, but that an indigenous system of plant cultivation may have been in place by the mid Holocene.

“The adoption of domesticated rice was slow and gradual in this region; it was not a rapid transformation as in other places. Our findings may indicate why this was the case. People may have been busy with other types of cultivation, ignoring rice, which may have been in the landscape, but as a minor plant for a long time before it too became a food staple.

“Future work will focus on grinding stones from nearby sites to see if this pattern is repeated along the coast.”

Contributing Source : University of Leicester

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Historical artefacts can be used as a powerful tool to reinforce group identity and forge a nation-state, but their use can have adverse consequences such as the oppression of minorities.

A diagram is used to summarise the complex identity relationships between states and nations. The power of historical artefacts derives from the duality of their nature; they are both a concrete proof of an historical fact and the basis for an abstract construction of meaning. Three case studies are used to provide examples of the use and abuse of archaeology.

From the earliest pre-historic times to the present day man has formed groups which transcend family as a way of organising and regulating society. These groupings, whether Iron Age tribes, Athenian city states or modern nations, have been bound together by many factors such as territory, language and culture. Since the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia the nation state has become the main entity through which international relations are organised; even with the development of supra-national bodies, and the changes wrought by globalisation, the nation state has remained pre-eminent.

The decline of the nation-state as the foremost way in which international relations are conceived has been much debated but, like Mark Twain, rumours of its death appear to have been exaggerated. Whether it is in Scotland or the Balkans, national groups, using the rhetoric of nationalism, seek independent nation status as the pinnacle of self determination; alternatives, such as greater autonomy within the existing state, are seen as a lesser status.

The terms ‘nation’, ‘state’, and ‘nation-state’ are often regarded as synonyms; this is incorrect and, whilst recognising their limitations and contested nature, for the purposes of this paper the definitions proposed by Smith will be used. A ‘state’ is a public institution exercising a monopoly of coercion and extraction within a given territory; a ‘nation’ is a cultural and political bond uniting a single political community. A ‘nation-state’ exists where there is complete congruence between the territory of the ‘state’ and that of the ‘nation’.

Using case studies of National Socialist Germany, Israel, and Bosnia, which show different aspects of how archaeology is used, this paper will explore the importance of associating individual identity with a nation. The tensions between archaeology as an academic discipline, the political milieu, and the use to which it is put, will be explored. The role that identification plays in building and maintaining stable states will be discussed.

The MOD and Westminster Abbey will formally mark the bravery and dedication of those who fought in the Korean War over 60 years ago.

A parade and muster of veterans, and a service of thanksgiving at Westminster Abbey, will take place in London on Thursday 11 July 2013.

Some 100,000 British troops served on the Korean Peninsula, many of them National Servicemen, as part of a United Nations force after North Korean troops invaded South Korea in June 1950. They fought with conviction for peace alongside servicemen from the United States of America, Canada, Australia, India and many other UN member states.

An armistice was signed on 27 July 1953, by which point over 1,000 British servicemen had lost their lives and some 1,060 taken prisoner by the North Korean forces. Most famously, nearly all those in 1st Battalion The Gloucestershire Regiment (now part of The Rifles) were killed or taken prisoner during the Battle of the Imjin River in April 1951.

Mark Francois, Minister of State for Defence Personnel, Welfare and Veterans, said:

Sixty years on the Korean War remains an international conflict in which Britain played a significant role and one that should never be forgotten.

The commemorations to mark the 60th anniversary will, I hope, be a fitting way for the nation to give thanks to both the veterans and those who paid the ultimate price in a bitterly fought campaign.”

Approximately 500 British veterans of the Korean War will march from Horse Guards to Westminster Abbey, remembering those involved in the campaign. A dedicated service of thanksgiving at Westminster Abbey will follow.

Representatives of the British Korean Veterans Association will attend a General Assembly of the International Federation of Korean War Veterans Associations in Seoul from 23 to 27 July 2013, and a Korean War Commemoration Day at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire on 27 July 2013.

Contributing Source : Defence News

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An archaeological reporting scheme which helps the marine aggregate industry report historical finds from the seabed will benefit from a renewed funding deal between The Crown Estate and the British Marine Aggregate Producers Association (BMAPA).

The Marine Aggregate Archaeological Reporting Protocol, set up by the BMAPA and English Heritage in 2005 and operated by Wessex Archaeology, will receive £60,000 from The Crown Estate over the next three years as part of the organisation’s Marine Stewardship Fund, which has provided funding to support the scheme since 2009.

Under the reporting protocol, employees across the marine aggregate industry are able to help protect the UK’s submerged heritage by reporting finds to Wessex Archaeology which then consults a range of internal and external experts who ensure items are correctly identified and recognised for their historical value. Where the finds are considered to be significant, such as military remains, additional management measures can be introduced by industry operators to ensure that sensitive sites are able to be protected.

The protocol was developed in in 2003 for BMAPA after a guidance note produced in partnership with English Heritage identified a need in identifying and understanding finds of archaeological importance external to the environmental assessment process when operating dredging areas. The guidance note highlighted that knowledge of an aggregate area’s historical significance could be enhanced by an understanding of any artefacts and archaeological deposits within and beneath the seabed. The archaeological protocol was developed to ensure that any finds of potential archaeological importance discovered during all the UK marine aggregate industry’s operations could be reported to heritage experts so their significance could be assessed. This is a model that has since been adopted by other marine sectors such as the offshore renewables developers through The Crown Estate Offshore Renewables Protocol for Archaeological Discoveries scheme.

Since the launch of the protocol this knowledge has improved with many interesting finds reported, most recently this has included a Single Sheave Snatch Block formally used to move cargo on and off ships as well as a variety of cannon balls and cutlery issued to the army during World War II. Over the seven years in which the protocol has been operating, over 880 individual finds have been reported by industry staff. Some of these relate to archaeologically significant items such as Palaeolithic hand axes from off Great Yarmouth and aircraft crash site material.

In addition to the reporting system, the scheme also includes an awareness programme which involves Wessex Archaeology visits to wharves and vessels in Britain and on the continent to raise awareness of archaeology and the protocol among industry staff.

Fiona Wynne, Stewardship Manager at The Crown Estate, said:

“The protocol highlights the responsible approach being taken by the British marine aggregate industry to minimise its impact on the historic marine environment. We are pleased to have been able to continue our support for this worthwhile project, which will not only enable us to support our tenants in their activities but also help us understand more about the seabed we manage and the heritage it contains.”

Mark Russell, Director of the British Marine Aggregate Producers Association, said:

“Staff working in the industry at wharves or on board dredgers can encounter archaeological finds during their day to day work, so the existence of this single protocol is critical to ensuring any items of potential interest are reported consistently. This in turn allows their significance to be assessed by heritage experts. We are delighted with The Crown Estate’s continued funding, without which it would not be possible to continue running the protocol.”

Euan McNeill, Director, Coastal and Marine at Wessex Archaeology said :

“The on-going use of the protocol has greatly enhanced our knowledge of the archaeology in the areas where dredging is active and has led to some finds of international importance, such as the Palaeolithic artefacts from off the east coast and raised awareness of important material such as that from aircraft crash sites from World War II. We are delighted to have the continuing support of the Marine Stewardship Fund in enabling this important work to continue.”

Contributing Source : The Crown Estate

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DNA analysis is unearthing the origins of the Minoans, who some 5,000 years ago established the first advanced Bronze Age civilization in present-day Crete. The findings suggest they arose from an ancestral Neolithic population that had arrived in the region about 4,000 years earlier.

The British archeologist Sir Arthur Evans in the early 1900′s named the Minoans after a legendary Greek king, Minos. Based on similarities between Minoan artifacts and those from Egypt and Libya, Evans proposed that the Minoan civilization founders migrated into the area from North Africa. Since then, other archaeologists have suggested that the Minoans may have come from other regions, possibly Turkey, the Balkans, or the Middle East.

Now, a team of researchers in the United States and Greece has used mitochondrial DNA analysis of Minoan skeletal remains to determine the likely ancestors of these ancient people.

Mitochondria, the energy powerhouses of cells, contain their own DNA, or genetic code. Because mitochondrial DNA is passed down from mothers to their children via the human egg, it contains information about maternal ancestry.

Results published May 14 in Nature Communications suggest that the Minoan civilization arose from the population already living in Bronze Age Crete. The findings indicate that these people probably were descendents of the first humans to reach Crete about 9,000 years ago, and that they have the greatest genetic similarity with modern European populations.

Dr. George Stamatoyannopoulos, University of Washington professor of medicine and genome sciences, is the paper’s senior author. He believes that the data highlight the importance of DNA analysis as a tool for understanding human history.

“About 9,000 years ago,” he noted, “there was an extensive migration of Neolithic humans from the regions of Anatolia that today comprise parts of Turkey and the Middle East. At the same time, the first Neolithic inhabitants reached Crete.”

“Our mitochondrial DNA analysis shows that the Minoan’s strongest genetic relationships are with these Neolithic humans, as well as with ancient and modern Europeans,” he explained.

“These results suggest the Minoan civilization arose 5,000 years ago in Crete from an ancestral Neolithic population that had arrived in the region about 4,000 years earlier,” he said. “Our data suggest that the Neolithic population that gave rise to the Minoans also migrated into Europe and gave rise to modern European peoples.”

Stamatoyannopoulos, who directs the UW Markey Molecular Medicine Center and who formerly headed the UW Division of Medical Genetics in the Department of Medicine, added, “Genetic analyses are playing in increasingly important role and predicting and protecting human health. Our study underscores the importance of DNA not only in helping us to have healthier futures, but also to understand our past.”

Stamatoyannopoulos and his research team analyzed samples from 37 skeletons found in a cave in Crete’s Lassithi plateau and compared them with mitochondrial DNA sequences from 135 modern and ancient human populations. The Minoan samples revealed 21 distinct mitochondrial DNA variations, of which six were unique to the Minoans and 15 were shared with modern and ancient populations. None of the Minoans carried mitochondrial DNA variations characteristic of African populations.

Further analysis showed that the Minoans were only distantly related to Egyptian, Libyan, and other North African populations. The Minoan shared the greatest percentage of their mitochondrial DNA variation with European populations, especially those in Northern and Western Europe.

When plotted geographically, shared Minoan mitochondrial DNA variation was lowest in North Africa and increased progressively across the Middle East, Caucasus, Mediterranean islands, Southern Europe, and mainland Europe. The highest percentage of shared Minoan mitochondrial DNA variation was found with Neolithic populations from Southern Europe.

The analysis also showed a high degree of sharing with the current population of the Lassithi plateau and Greece. In fact, the maternal genetic information passed down through many generations of mitochondria is still present in modern-day residents of the Lassithi plateau.

Contributing Source : University of Washington

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A scientist has discovered an ancient extinct creature with ‘scissor hand-like’ claws in fossil records and has named it in honour of his favourite movie star.

The 505 million year old fossil called Kooteninchela deppi (pronounced Koo-ten-ee-che-la depp-eye), which is a distant ancestor of lobsters and scorpions, was named after the actor Johnny Depp for his starring role as Edward Scissorhands – a movie about an artificial man named Edward, an unfinished creation, who has scissors for hands.

Kooteninchela deppi is helping researchers to piece together more information about life on Earth during the Cambrian period when nearly all modern animal types emerged.

David Legg, who carried out the research as part of his PhD in the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at Imperial College London, says:

“When I first saw the pair of isolated claws in the fossil records of this species I could not help but think of Edward Scissorhands. Even the genus name, Kootenichela, includes the reference to this film as ‘chela’ is Latin for claws or scissors. In truth, I am also a bit of a Depp fan and so what better way to honour the man than to immortalise him as an ancient creature that once roamed the sea?”

Kooteninchela deppi lived in very shallow seas, similar to modern coastal environments, off the cost of British Columbia in Canada, which was situated much closer to the equator 500 million years ago. The sea temperature would have been much hotter than it is today and although coral reefs had not yet been established, Kooteninchela deppi would have lived in a similar environment consisting of sponges.

The researcher believes that Kooteninchela deppi would have been a hunter or scavenger. Its large Edward Scissorhands-like claws with their elongated spines may have been used to capture prey, or they could have helped it to probe the sea floor looking for sea creatures hiding in sediment.

Kooteninchela deppi was approximately four centimetres long with an elongated trunk for a body and millipede-like legs, which it used to scuttle along the sea floor with the occasional short swim.

It also had large eyes composed of many lenses like the compound eyes of a fly. They were positioned on top of movable stalks called peduncles to help it more easily search for food and look out for predators.

The researcher discovered that Kooteninchela deppi belongs to a group known as the ‘great-appendage’ arthropods, or megacheirans, which refers to the enlarged pincer-like frontal claws that they share. The ‘great-appendage’ arthropods are an early relation of arthropods, which includes spiders, scorpions, centipedes, millipedes, insects and crabs.

David Legg adds: “Just imagine it: the prawns covered in mayonnaise in your sandwich, the spider climbing up your wall and even the fly that has been banging into your window and annoyingly flying into your face are all descendants of Kooteninchela deppi. Current estimates indicate that there are more than one million known insects and potentially 10 million more yet to be categorised, which potentially means that Kooteninchela Deppi has a huge family tree.”

In the future, David Legg intends to further his research and study fossilised creatures from the Ordovician, the geological period that saw the largest increase in diversity of species on the planet. He hopes to understand why this happened in order to learn more about the current diversity of species on Earth.

Contributing Source : Imperial College London

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In research published today in the prestigious international journal PLOS ONE, the team are able to identify what is likely to be the first group of people to colonise Marlborough’s Wairau Bar possibly from Polynesia around 700 years ago. They also present evidence suggesting that individuals from two other groups buried at the site had likely lived in different regions of New Zealand before being buried at Wairau Bar.

The researchers, co-ordinated by the Department of Anatomy’s Associate Professor Hallie Buckley, undertook isotopic analyses of samples recovered from the koiwi tangata (human remains) of the Rangitane iwi tupuna prior to their reburial at Wairau Bar in 2009.

The Wairau Bar Koiwi Project is part of a larger archaeological project being conducted in collaboration with the Rangitane iwi, the Canterbury Museum and the University of Otago. The interpretation of these new data was strengthened by collaboration with colleagues from SPAR, the University of Otago archaeologists who undertook the more recent archaeological excavations at the site.

“By examining ratios of carbon and nitrogen isotopes present in bone collagen we were able to estimate individuals’ broad dietary makeup over a 10-20 year period prior to death. Our analysis of strontium isotopes in teeth allowed us to distinguish between people growing up in geologically different landscapes,” says Dr Rebecca Kinaston, who conducted the isotope analyses on the bones and teeth.

The tupuna were originally buried in three separate groups in a large village at the Wairau site. First excavated over 70 years ago, this ancient settlement is one of the most important archaeological sites in New Zealand because of its age and the range of east Polynesian type artefacts found there.

Previous research found that one of the burial groups displayed distinct cultural differences to the two other burial groups at the site. These included the positions in which they were interred and the presence of more numerous and rich grave offerings, including whale bone ornaments and moa eggs generally not found with the other two groups.

The new isotopic analysis of bone collagen and teeth suggests that members of this first group shared similar diets and childhood origins, while individuals in Groups 2 and 3 displayed highly variable diets and spent their childhood in geologically different areas to Group 1.

“Interestingly, Group 1 individuals showed a dietary trend similar to that identified in prehistoric individuals from a site in the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia, with both sets of people sharing a low diversity in protein sources,” Dr Kinaston says.

In contrast, dietary patterns in Groups 2 and 3 were found to be in line with individuals who spent most of their lives eating from a wide range of protein sources, such as would be available through New Zealand’s then bountiful seal, moa and other bird populations.

The large range found in Group 2 and 3’s strontium isotope ratios could reflect that they grew up in regions outside of Wairau Bar—but not where Group 1 did—and also that they were hunting and gathering across a wide geographical range, says Associate Professor Hallie Buckley.

“This is consistent with other archaeological evidence that the first settlers in New Zealand were highly mobile. That members of Groups 2 and 3 were still buried back at Wairau suggests that this village may have fulfilled both a ceremonial and home base function.”

If this is the case, this may represent the roots of the tangihanga ritual, in which Maori are buried in their ancestral lands, developing among these first New Zealanders, Associate Professor Buckley says.

Contributing Source : University of Otago

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Both moms and dads helped with incubation

A university study into the incubation behavior of modern birds is shedding new light on the type of parental care carried out by their long extinct ancestors.

The study, by researchers at George Mason University and University of Lincoln (United Kingdom), aimed to test the hypothesis that data from exisiting birds could be used to predict the incubation behaviour of Theropods, a group of carnivorous dinosaurs from which birds descended.

The paper, out today in Biology Letters, was co-written by Geoff Birchard from the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at Mason and Charles Deeming and Marcello Ruta from the University of Lincoln’s School of Life Sciences.

A 2009 study in the journal Science suggested that it was males of the small, carnivorous dinosaurs Troodon and Oviraptor that incubated their eggs. However, by taking into account factors known to affect egg and clutch mass in living bird species, the authors found that shared incubation with mature young was the ancestral incubation behavior rather than male-only incubation, which had been claimed previously for these Theropod dinosaurs.

“The previous study was carried out to infer the type of parental care in dinosaurs that are closely related to birds,” said Birchard. “That study proposed that paternal care was present in these dinosaurs and this form of care was the ancestral condition for birds. Our new analysis, based on three times as many species as in the previous study, indicates that parental care cannot be inferred from simple analyses of the relationship of body size to clutch mass. Such analyses have to take into account factors such as shared evolutionary history and maturity at hatching.

The group decided to repeat the Science study with a larger data set and a better understanding of bird biology because other palaeontologists were starting to use the original results to predict the incubation behavior of other dinosaur species.

“Irrespective of whether you accept the idea of Theropod dinosaurs sitting on eggs like birds or not, the analysis raised some concerns that we wanted to address,” said Deeming. “Our analysis of the relationship between female body mass and clutch mass was interesting in its own right, but also showed that it was not possible to conclude anything about incubation in extinct distant relatives of the birds.”

The project has helped in understanding the factors affecting the evolution of incubation in birds. More importantly it is hoped that the new analysis will assist palaeontologists in their interpretation of future finds of dinosaur reproduction in the fossil record.

Contributing Source : George Mason University

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An international team of scientists have revealed a new species of ichthyosaur (a dolphin-like marine reptile from the age of dinosaurs) from Iraq, which revolutionises our understanding of the evolution and extinction of these ancient marine reptiles.

The results, produced by a collaboration of researchers from universities and museums in Belgium and the UK and published today (May 15) in Biology Letters, contradict previous theories that suggest the ichthyosaurs of the Cretaceous period (the span of time between 145 and 66 million years ago) were the last survivors of a group on the decline.

Ichthyosaurs are marine reptiles known from hundreds of fossils from the time of the dinosaurs. “They ranged in size from less than one to over 20 metres in length. All gave birth to live young at sea, and some were fast-swimming, deep-diving animals with enormous eyeballs and a so-called warm-blooded physiology,” says lead author Dr Valentin Fischer of the University of Liege in Belgium.

Until recently, it was thought that ichthyosaurs declined gradually in diversity through multiple extinction events during the Jurassic period. These successive events were thought to have killed off all ichthyosaurs except those strongly adapted for fast-swimming life in the open ocean. Due to this pattern, it has been assumed that ichthyosaurs were constantly and rapidly evolving to be ever-faster open-water swimmers; seemingly, there was no ‘stasis’ in their long evolutionary history.

However, an entirely new ichthyosaur from the Kurdistan region of Iraq substantially alters this view of the group. The specimen concerned was found during the 1950s by British petroleum geologists. “The fossil – a well-preserved partial skeleton that consists of much of the front half of the animal – wasn’t exactly being treated with the respect it deserves. Preserved within a large, flat slab of rock, it was being used as a stepping stone on a mule track,” says co-author Darren Naish of the University of Southampton. “Luckily, the geologists realized its potential importance and took it back to the UK, where it remains today,” adds Dr Naish, who is based at the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton.

Jurassic extinction survivor Acamptonectes. Robert Nicholls

Study of the specimen began during the 1970s with ichthyosaur expert Robert Appleby, then of University College, Cardiff. “Robert Appleby recognised that the specimen was significant, but unfortunately died before resolving the precise age of the fossil, which he realised was critical,” says Jeff Liston of National Museums Scotland and manager of the research project. “So continuation of the study fell to a new generation of researchers.”

In the new study (which properly includes Appleby as an author), researchers name it Malawania anachronus, which means ‘out of time swimmer’. Despite being Cretaceous in age, Malawania represents the last-known member of a kind of ichthyosaur long believed to have gone extinct during the Early Jurassic, more than 66 million years earlier. Remarkably, this kind of archaic ichthyosaur appears characterised by an evolutionary stasis: they seem not to have changed much between the Early Jurassic and the Cretaceous, a very rare feat in the evolution of marine reptiles.

“Malawania‘s discovery is similar to that of the coelacanth in the 1930s: it represents an animal that seems ‘out of time’ for its age. This ‘living fossil’ of its time demonstrates the existence of a lineage that we had never even imagined. Maybe the existence of such Jurassic-style ichthyosaurs in the Cretaceous has been missed because they always lived in the Middle-East, a region that has previously yielded only a single, very fragmentary ichthyosaur fossil,” adds Dr Fischer.

Thanks to both their study of microscopic spores and pollen preserved on the same slab as Malawania, and to their several analyses of the ichthyosaur family tree, Fischer and his colleagues retraced the evolutionary history of Cretaceous ichthyosaurs. In fact, the team was able to show that numerous ichthyosaur groups that appeared during the Triassic and Jurassic ichthyosaur survived into the Cretaceous. It means that the supposed end of Jurassic extinction event did not ever occur for ichthyosaurs, a fact that makes their fossil record quite different from that of other marine reptile groups.

When viewed together with the discovery of another ichthyosaur by the same team in 2012 and named Acamptonectes densus, the discovery of Malawania constitutes a ‘revolution’ in how we imagine ichthyosaur evolution and extinction. It now seems that ichthyosaurs were still important and diverse during the early part of the Cretaceous. The final extinction of the ichthyosaurs – an event that occurred about 95 million years ago (long before the major meteorite-driven extinction event that ended the Cretaceous) – is now even more confusing than previously assumed.

Contributing Source : University of Southampton

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