Time flies: Insect fossils in amber shed light on India’s geological history
A new species of fungus gnat in Indian amber closely resembles its fossil relatives from Europe, disproving the concept of a strongly isolated Indian subcontinent.
Category : Palaeontology
HeritageDaily – Palaeontology & fossil news and dinosaur press releases from across the globe
The secrets behind T. rex’s bone crushing bites: Researchers find T. rex could crush 8,000 pounds
The giant Tyrannosaurus rex pulverized bones by biting down with forces equalling the weight of three small cars while simultaneously generating world record tooth pressures,
Baleen whales’ ancestors were toothy suction feeders
Modern whales' ancestors probably hunted and chased down prey, but somehow, those fish-eating hunters evolved into filter-feeding leviathans.
Antibiotic-resistant microbes date back to 450 million years ago
Leading hospital "superbugs," known as the enterococci, arose from an ancestor that dates back 450 million years -- about the time when animals were first
Researchers identify evidence of oldest orchid fossil on record
The orchid family has some 28,000 species – more than double the number of bird species and quadruple the mammal species. As it turns out,
‘Last African dinosaur’ discovered in Moroccan mine
One of the last dinosaurs living in Africa before their extinction 66 million years ago has been discovered in a phosphate mine in northern Morocco.
New species of dinosaur increases the already unexpected diversity of ‘whiplash dinosaurs’
Researchers from Italy and Portugal describe yet another new sauropod species from 150 million years ago, from Wyoming, USA
Earliest relative of Brachiosaurus dinosaur found in France
Scientists have re-examined an overlooked museum fossil and discovered that it is the earliest known member of the titanosauriform family of dinosaurs.
Evolution: On mosaics and melting-pots
Genetic studies of cichlid fishes suggest that interspecies hybrids played a prominent role in their evolution. Analysis of a unique fossil cichlid from the Upper
How life (barely) survived the greatest extinction?
An international team of researchers at the University of Calgary and the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology of the Chinese Academy of Science have
Headless dinosaur reunited with its skull, one century later
After being headless for almost a century, a dinosaur skeleton that had become a tourist attraction in Dinosaur Provincial Park was finally reconnected to its
Paleontologists identify new 508-million-year-old sea creature with can opener-like pincers
Paleontologists at the University of Toronto (U of T) and the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) have uncovered a new fossil species that sheds light on
Trace Fossils Discovered of an Unknown Reptile Species Existing 247 Million Years Ago
The several excavation campaigns conducted in 2012 by geologists, biologists and palaeontologists of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) and the Institut Català de Paleontologia
Mammoths suffered from diseases that are typical for people
Sergey Leshchinskiy, paleontologist, head of TSU's Laboratory of Mesozoic and Cenozoic Continental Ecosystems, has studied the remains of Yakut mammoths collected on one of the
Genetic evidence points to nocturnal early mammals
Our earliest mammalian ancestors likely skulked through the dark, using their powerful night-time vision to find food and avoid reptilian predators that hunted by day.
Sea scorpions: The original sea monster
Four hundred and thirty million years ago, long before the evolution of barracudas or sharks, a different kind of predator stalked the primordial seas. The
99-million-year-old termite-loving thieves caught in Burmese amber
Eusocial insects, such as ants, social wasps and bees, and termites, include some of the most ecologically ubiquitous of terrestrial animals. The nests of these
Scientists discover fossil of dinosaur ancestor with surprising croc-like appearance
Scientists have long wondered what the earliest dinosaur relatives looked like. Most assumed they would resemble miniature dinosaurs, about the size of chickens, and walk
HKU palaeontologist reconstructs feathered dinosaurs in the flesh
Until now it has been hard to get an accurate idea of the shape of a dinosaur from its fossilised remains, as only their bones
Scientists determined the time of extinction of ancient porcupines
A team of specialists that included scientists from Siberia, the Urals, and the University of Arizona, USA, conducted radiocarbon dating of the teeth and bones
The last ‘caimans’ living in Spain
Sixteen million years ago, the reptile Diplocynodon ratelii lived in wooded ecosystems among the lakes and pools of what we know today as Catalonia (Spain).
Male or female? Scientist challenges evidence of sex differences among dinosaurs
A paleontologist at the Canadian Museum of Nature is countering decades of studies that assert that some dinosaurs can be identified as male or female