Fossil Friday Roundup: December 9, 2016

Feature Image: A rendering of the early marsupial relative, Didelphodon vorax. (First Paper) Credit: Misaki Ouchida

Papers (All Open Access):

• A large carnivorous mammal from the Late Cretaceous and the North American origin of marsupials (Nature Communications)
• Fruits, seeds and flowers from the Bovay and Bolden clay pits (early Eocene Tallahatta Formation, Claiborne Group), northern Mississippi, USA (Palaeontologia Electronica)
• Antarctotrechus balli sp. n. (Carabidae, Trechini): the first ground beetle from Antarctica (Zookeys)
• Evolutionary convergence in conodonts revealed by Synchrotron-based Tomographic Microscopy (PalaeoE)
• Phylogenetic and environmental context of a Tournaisian tetrapod fauna (Nature Ecology and Evolution)
• A Feathered Dinosaur Tail with Primitive Plumage Trapped in Mid-Cretaceous Amber (Cell Current Biology)
• Odontoma in a 255-Million-Year-Old Mammalian Forebear (JAMA Oncology)
• First comprehensive morphological analysis on the metapodials of Giraffidae (Palaeontologia Electronica)
• Ear Structures of the Naked Mole-Rat, Heterocephalus glaber, and Its Relatives (Rodentia: Bathyergidae) (PLOS ONE)
• Experimental evidence for the co-evolution of hominin tool-making teaching and language (Nature Communications)
• The origin of animals: Can molecular clocks and the fossil record be reconciled? (BioEssays)
• Evidence for social parasitism of early insect societies by Cretaceous rove beetles (Nature Communications)

News:

• Alberta: Vast badlands once a real Jurassic Park (Link)
• ‘Slam-dunk’ find puts hunter-gatherers in Florida 14,500 years ago (Link)
• Virginia Tech Geoscientists Size-Up Early Dinosaurs, Find Surprising Variation (Link)

Society Events, Meetings, Announcements, and Updates:

• Workshop: “Traits past, present, and future: Quantitative approaches to conservation and climate change biology in Africa”, March 6-8, 2017, Nairobi, Kenya
• Workshop: “Finite Element Analysis Applied to Life Sciences”, July 3-8th, 2017, Barcelona, Spain
• BLM and SVP seek comments from the community regarding the Paleontological Resources Preservation Act (PRPA). Deadline is February 6, 2017. For additional information: Fossil Preservation Law in the US

Around the Blogosphere:

• Third molar agenesis: a puzzling case of recent human evolution (John Hawks)
• A Mammoth on the Metro (English) / Un Mamut en el Metro (Español) (Dr. Neurosaurus)
• The Strange Case of the Crocodile’s Snout. Part 1: Answerless Questions (Extinct Blog)
• Parksosaurus (Equatorial Minnesota)
• Tetrapod Triumph! Solving Mystery Of First Land Vertebrates (Discover Magazine)
• Fossil Octopus Is a Jurassic Jewel (Laelaps)
• Partners is Paleontology: BLM Co-Chairs Society of Vertebrate Paleontology’s International Conference (My Public Lands)
• The Remarkably Weird Skeletons of Frogs (Tetrapod Zoology)
• Mesozoic Miscellany 90 (Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs)
• The Case of the Stolen Tylosaurus (Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs)
• Paleo Profile: The Dream Coast Crocodile (Laelaps)
• Found: A Missing Link in Whale Evolution (Discover Magazine)
• Vintage Dinosaur Art: Animals of Long Ago (Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs)
• Anthracobunids: Amphibious Mammals of Eocene Asia (Life in the Cenozoic Era)
• Turkey: your delicious Christmas dinner dinosaur (The Guardian)
• Imaging Life on Earth… (Dinosaur Sabbatical)
• Webinars to Watch: Learning More Fossil Skills Online (Curious Paleo)
• Four-Legged 350-Million-Year-Old Fossils Fill An Evolutionary Gap (Forbes)
• Feathered dinosaur tail in amber! (Musings of a Clumsy Paleontologist)
• High Variation in Postnatal Development of Early Dinosaurs (Letters from Gondwana)
• We Still Don’t Know What Killed the Biggest Shark of All Time (Laelaps)
• Paleo Profile: Buriol’s Robber (Laelaps)

Non-Paleo Blogs of Interest

• OpenCon Berlin – Great success! (Green Tea and Velociraptors)
• How not to respond to reviewers: Eight simple tips (NatureJobs)

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