Fossil Friday Roundup: September 29, 2017

Featured Image: Palaeolenus lantenoisi trilobite. From Hopkins et al. (2017). CC-BY.

Papers (All Open Access):

• A new Late Devonian isoetalean lycopsid from New South Wales, Australia: Cymastrobus irvingii gen. et sp. nov. (PalaeoE)
• Taxonomy and species diversity of Holocene pylonioid radiolarians from surface sediments of the northeastern Indian Ocean (PalaeoE)
• Late Permian wood-borings reveal an intricate network of ecological relationships (Nature Communications)
• Identifying the most surprising victims of mass extinction events: an example using Late Ordovician brachiopods (Biology Letters)
• Neoichnology of tarantulas (Araneae: Theraphosidae): Criteria for recognizing spider burrows in the fossil record (PalaeoE)
• The oldest known digestive system consisting of both paired digestive glands and a crop from exceptionally preserved trilobites of the Guanshan Biota (Early Cambrian, China) (PLOS ONE)
• Early establishment of vertebrate trophic interactions: Food web structure in Middle to Late Devonian fish assemblages with exceptional fossilization (Bulletin of Geosciences)
• Revision of Eocene electric rays (Torpediniformes, Batomorphii) from the Bolca Konservat-Lagerstätte, Italy, reveals the first fossil embryo in situ in marine batoids and provides new insights into the origin of trophic novelties in coral reef fishes (Journal of Systematic Paleontology)
• A classic Late Frasnian chondrichthyan assemblage from southern Belgium (AGP)
• Regional endothermy as a trigger for gigantism in some extinct macropredatory sharks (PLOS ONE)
• The continental fish fauna of the Late Cretaceous (Santonian) Iharkút locality (Bakony Mountains, Hungary) (Central European Geology)
• The first microfossil record of ichthyofauna from the Naujoji Akmenė Formation (Lopingian), Karpėnai Quarry, North Lithuania (Geological Quarterly)
• The toothless pterosaur Jidapterus edentus (Pterodactyloidea: Azhdarchoidea) from the Early Cretaceous Jehol Biota and its paleoecological implications (PLOS ONE)
• A basal ornithopod dinosaur from the Cenomanian of the Czech Republic (Journal of Systematic Palaeontology)
• The last dinosaurs of Brazil: The Bauru Group and its implications for the end-Cretaceous mass extinction (Link)
• Genomic Signature of an Avian Lilliput Effect across the K-Pg Extinction (Systematic Biology)
• New Finds of Hesperornithids in the European Russia, with Comments on the Systematics of Eurasian Hesperornithidae (Link)
• Ecomorphological characterization of murines and non-arvicoline cricetids (Rodentia) from south-western Europe since the latest Middle Miocene to the Mio-Pliocene boundary (MN 7/8–MN13) (PeerJ)
• New insights on Paludontona, an insular endemic lagomorph (Mammalia) from the Tusco-Sardinian palaeobioprovince (Italy, Turolian, Late Miocene) (Rivista Italiana Paleontologia e Stratigrafia)
• Dental enamel ultrastructure in Ochotona and Prolagus (Mammalia: Lagomorpha: Ochotonidae) from three late Miocene localities in Ukraine (PalaeoE)
• The earliest ossicone and post-cranial record of Giraffa (PLOS ONE)
• Did saber-tooth kittens grow up musclebound? A study of postnatal limb bone allometry in felids from the Pleistocene of Rancho La Brea (PLOS ONE)
• The lithic assemblages of Donggutuo, Nihewan basin: Knapping skills of early pleistocene hominins in North China (PLOS ONE)
• The stratigraphy of the Upper Greensand Formation (Albian, Cretaceous) of the Isle of Purbeck, Dorset, UK (AGP)

Community Events, Society Updates, and Resources:

• Upcoming National Fossil Day Events, Part 1 (PLOS Paleo)
• Call for Nominations: Nat’l Academy of Sciences Elliot Medal, due Oct. 12 (Link)
• Principles of Vertebrate Functional Morphology, October 16–20, 2017, Barcelona, Spain (Link)
• The Fourth TetZooCon (Link)
• The Science Ambassador Scholarship for female undergraduate and high school seniors, Deadline December 11, 2017 (Link)
• Trekking Across the GOBE: From the Cambrian through the Katian, IGCP 653 Annual Meeting, June 3-7, 2018, Athens, Ohio, USA (Link)
• North American Paleontological Convention June 23–27 2019 (Link)

News and Views:

Animals and Anatomy:

• Life on Mill Street (Equatorial Minnesota)
• DNA sequence data shows that this “living fossil” isn’t so fossilized after all (Molecular Ecologist)
• Protosphyraena: Like a Swordfish Made Babies With a Chainsaw (RMDRC Paleo Lab)
• Very Specific Strange Reptiles (Waxing Paleontological)
• A brief history of the Spinosaurus (Letters from Gondwana)
• There’s a lot to learn about dinosaur brains (Earth Touch News)
• Paleo Profile: Burian’s Lizard (Laelaps)
• Footprints of Large, Triassic Plant-Eating Dinosaurs Found in Greenland (PLOS Paleo)
• What is a Subspecies? (Synapsida)
• The horns of Arsinoitherium: covered in skin or augmented with keratin sheaths? (Mark Witton)
• Fossil Friday – Bison molar (Valley of the Mastodon)
• Sloth bones that are only skin deep (The Rafting Monkey)
• Human Evolution (Common Descent)
• Meet Alesi, the Prehistoric Infant Ape (Laelaps)

Museums, Methods, and Musings:

• International Symposium on the Ediacaran-Cambrian Transition (Palaeocast)
• Write me a review! (Archosaur Musings)
• Tracing respiratory structures (Time Scavengers)
• The “Growth series of one” poster is published (SV-POW)
• Valley of the Mastodons (initial pictorial interlude) (Mostly Mammoths, Mummies, and Museums)
• After years of digging and crowdfunding campaigns, T. rex now on display at KU Natural History Museum (Link)
• FossiLab Outreach at the Smithsonian (Time Scavengers)
• This Mesozoic Month: September 2017 (Love in the Time of Chasmosaurs)
• Documenting Cephalopods Part 2 The Anatomy of A Label (Fistful of Cinctans)

Featured Folks and Fieldwork:

• Sarah Sheffield, Invertebrate Paleobiologist (Time Scavengers)
• Forgotten women of paleontology: Margaret Benson (Letters from Gondwana)

Art, books, culture, and fun:

• Darin Croft’s Horned Armadillos and Rafting Monkeys (Tetrapod Zoology)
• You Should Read This Book (Extinct)
• A deeper look at the cheetah (Chasing Sabretooths)
• Science Literacy Week 2017: Stretching Imaginations (Pseudoplocephalus)
• New edition out for successful local author (Link)
• Paleoart: the evolution of dinosaur paintings, from watercolours to Soviet visions (Link)
• Gone to Texas (Paleo Porch)
• Dinosaurs & Comic Books!!! (Updates from the VMNH Paleo Lab)

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