nandi's blog

‘Jurassic Park’: T-Rex Nearly Killed a Crew Member

Tuesday, January 19, 2021

A scene from the film ‘Jurassic Park III’ | Universal/Getty Images

Working on a movie set can be a dangerous job. Just ask any of the countless actors and crew members who have been injured — or even killed — during the course of their work. Many of these accidents happen during stunt work.

For example, Jackie Chan cracked two vertebrae and dislocated his pelvis — ouch! — while filming Police Story. Margaret Hamilton, who played the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz, was supposed to disappear in a cloud of smoke, but when the stunt went awry, Hamilton ended up with third degree burns on her hands and second degree burns on her face! 

Of course, plenty of things that look dangerous on the screen are perfectly safe. They’re handled by CGI, crafty camerawork, and technological tools that can build the suspense without putting the professionals in harm’s way. One would think that would be the case for the set of Jurassic Park.

After all, there weren’t real murderous dinosaurs lurking about. Be that as it may, one crew member got the scare of his life when he was nearly killed by a T-Rex while creating the classic film. 

‘Jurassic Park’ was a thrilling suspense film 

Jurassic Park takes viewers on an up-close tour of a fantastical island run by a rich eccentric who wants nothing more than to bring the past to life. Using state-of-the-art technology, he creates living dinosaurs and plans to open up an amazing theme park where visitors can see these beasts in person. Before he can bring his dreams to life, however, things go wrong — in the deadliest way possible. 

These days, the original Jurassic Park is considered a fun piece of retro and nostalgic entertainment. Premiering in 1993, the film’s special effects aren’t really comparable to today’s in terms of realism. For it’s time, though, Jurassic Park used cutting edge technology to bring to life an experience unlike anything moviegoers, especially those who caught the flick in theaters, had experienced before.

Many other films of the era — and, honestly, many less well-handled films that came after it — had terrible CGI effects. Jurassic Park, however, featured top-notch work to make the thrilling suspense as real as possible. 

‘Jurassic Park’ has left a legacy

The star-studded Jurassic Park is a fun and nostalgia-filled film that left audiences ripe for a sequel. Films in the franchise released in 1997 and 2001 without much fanfare. More than twenty years after the original film released, the franchise saw a resurgence with Jurassic World bursting onto the scene. 

In this installment, the MCU’s Chris Pratt stars as Owen. Owen works at the newly built Jurassic Park, which has been revitalized on the ruins of the former and failed endeavor. The new facilitators, however, have bigger ideas on their mind than a theme park.

They’re breeding powerful hybrid dinosaurs with the hopes of militarizing their strength and weaponizing their abilities. Predictably, this plan doesn’t go smoothly, and an escaped Indominus Rex — one of the hybrid creatures — wreaks havoc for all involved. 

The film was so successful that it sparked even more sequels. In 2018, Pratt reprised his role for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, and the much-anticipated Jurassic World: Dominion is in post-production with an expected release date in 2022. 

A terrifying accident on ‘Jurassic Park’ left a crew member rattled

While the heart-stopping action filled the big screen, the actual set of Jurassic Park was filled with animatronic dinos brought to life with the help of CGI. In other words, the cast and crew didn’t actually have to face deadly beasts when they clocked in. 

As the Stan Winston School of Character Arts explains, though, that was little solace for one crew member who found himself in the clutches of a prehistoric beast. One of the animatronic creatures has been brought to the set to test it before fitting it with skin to complete the look.

“We had to actually pull the skin on, glue it down from the inside, and sew it all up once we were there,” Alan Scott explained. The long skins required crew members to crawl inside the creature to fully secure them, and that’s when tragedy (almost) struck. 

Scott remembers volunteering to do the hard part, and he warned the tech on set to keep him safe: “Don’t shut it down, and make sure nobody trips on this cord. I’m going to be inside, and if this thing moves, with all those hydraulics inside, I’m dead.”

Not long after that warning, Scott found himself trapped inside the moving beast as it powered down. Luckily, he was able to pull his arms and legs in close to his body and avoid injury. Some crew members pried the jaws open and pulled him to safety. 

Source: www.cheatsheet.com/

No Dinosaurs Gere: 'Permian Monsters' Exhibit Opens at Drexel University's Natural Sciences Museum

Tuesday, January 19, 2021

Titanophoneus is an extinct meat-eater that had a long heavy snout on a 2-feet-six-inch skull. Photo by Gondwana Studios

They look like dinosaurs. They sound like dinosaurs. They probably even smell like dinosaurs (if there was any way to know that for sure).

Yet, the creatures at the new special exhibit at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University (usually known as the dinosaur museum) are not the nightmares of Jurassic Park. Titled “Permian Monsters: Life Before the Dinosaurs,” the exhibit features what just might be the parents and grandparents of the more famous giants.

“Who hasn’t wanted to be transported to another world during this past year,” said Ted Daeschler, a research paleontologist at the museum and a professor of geosciences at Drexel University. “We all love dinosaurs. There is not a single dinosaur in this room. We are looking at another world. This exhibit is a portal into a world that few have actually seen. Yet, it’s a world that played a very consequential role in the history of ecosystems and the history of life on earth.”

So, whether it be a shark that looks like it has a circular saw in its mouth or strange reptile precursors of mammals, a vicious giant saber-toothed gorgonopsid, visitors will discover extinct creatures that ruled the world millions of years before the dinosaurs.

Dinocephalian Estemmenosuchus from Permian Monsters. Photo by Gondwana Studios

The Permian period took place 299 to 251 million years ago, a relatively short time period in the history of the world, but, you know, a bit ago.

“The first thing I would say to visitors coming into this exhibit is, ‘Remember, dinosaurs are a specific group of animals,’” Daeschler said. “They dominated just a part of geologic time. The world of the dinosaurs was preceded by other worlds and other casts of characters.”

The world these creatures roamed was mostly a large land mass (Pangea) surrounded by a large sea. The land was mostly dry, the interior of which probably saw little or no rainfall. So, the animals had to adapt.

While they look like lizards and other reptiles we might know today, they are actually quite different.

An animatronic Dinocephalian Titanophoneus with a mural backdrop of its setting. Photo by Gondwana Studios

“Back in this exhibit, you will see large, toothy, reptile-like animals that are not reptiles at all,” said Daeschler. “They are actually part of a Permian explosion of diversity within another group of land-living, limbed animals. Most branches of this dramatic, synapsid diversity did not reach past the Permian period.”

While many don’t exactly know what happened to these animals, many scientists believe the mass extinction was because, of all things, global warming.

“Among those that did survive, which weren’t many, are the precursors of mammals,” Daeschler said. “So we, as mammals, are part of the same branch from the tree of life as many of these large, reptile-like forms.”

“Permian Monsters: Life Before the Dinosaurs” was set to open in November, but the COVID-19 shut down of the museums caused a bit of a delay. The Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University is now back open Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., with a members-only hour from 10 to 11 a.m. each day.

Cacops model in Permian Monsters. Photo by Gondwana Studios

There are, of course, safety protocols.

Visitors and staff will be required to wear face coverings and to maintain social distancing of 6 feet. Hand sanitizer stations are placed throughout the museum and plexiglass partitions installed in the admissions areas. Strenuous high-grade cleaning and sanitizing will take place at regular intervals throughout each day.

In order to limit the number of visitors in the building at any one time to 25% capacity and to limit contact at check-in, admission will be by timed ticket sold online in advance. Time slots will start at the top of the hour, with the last ticket of the day issued for 4 p.m. A number of tickets will be available at the door, but visitors may have to wait for a time slot to become available.

Full details on purchasing tickets and other admissions issues are available at The Academy of Natural Science's website.

Source: www.timesherald.com/

Dinosaur Fossils Found in Argentina Could Belong to Largest Creature Ever to Have Walked the Earth

Tuesday, January 19, 2021

Artist’s impression of an Argentinosaurus (Getty)

Titanosaur in Patagonia ‘probably exceeds’ largest known land animal, paleontologists say.

A new and gigantic dinosaur which could rival the largest known species is being unearthed in Argentina.

A collection of bones found in Neuquén Province in northwest Patagonia have been identified as those from the sauropod family of dinosaurs, which had immensely long necks and tails, pillar-like legs, and includes species that grew to the largest sizes of land animals known to have ever existed.

The creature (pictured) is believed to be a titanosaur, one of the largest sauropods — a clade of dinosaurs characterised by their vast size, pillar-like legs and elongated necks and tails

However, the remains are not a complete skeleton, and consist mainly of pelvic bones and vertebrae, only giving an indication of the enormous scale of the animal.

The authors of a paper presenting the research on the find published in the journal Cretaceous Research suggest the animal could come from a previously unknown population of Patagonian sauropods.

The closest relative is Andesaurus, a type of “super-sized titanosaur” which existed during the middle of the Cretaceous Period in South America. These large sauropods grew to be 18 metres long.

The fossilised remains (pictured here being prepared for extraction from the field) were found in layers of rock that the geologists refer to as the 'Candeleros Formation' — and more specifically in a level that is though to represent the deposits from a muddy floodplain

However, the fossilised bone fragments indicate the new titanosaur was far larger, easily exceeding Andesaurus in size and likely making it bigger then the largest known land animals, the Patagotitan and Argentinosaurus - both types of sauropods.

The new specimen is “considered one of the largest sauropods ever found, probably exceeding Patagotitan in size”, the authors said.

The fossilised bones (pictured) of a dinosaur unearthed in Argentina that would have stomped the earth 98 million years ago may have been the largest land animal ever

Patagotitan was only announced by paleontologists in 2014, after the first bones were uncovered in Patagonia in 2013. It is believed to have weighed almost 60 tonnes, reached lengths of over 31 metres and at the time, experts said: “Given the size of these bones, which surpass any of the previously known giant animals, the new dinosaur is the largest animal known that walked on Earth.”

Unlike other remains excavated from the formation, this specimen — which has been designated 'MOZ-Pv 1221' — remained largely articulated, suggesting that more of the skeleton will likely be uncovered in the same spot as the dig progressed. Pictured, an artist's impression of MOZ-Pv 1221 and — beneath it — two other sauropods from the same location, Limaysaurus (left) and Andesaurus (right)

The researchers said: “The record of super-sized titanosaur sauropods has traditionally been extremely fragmentary, although recent discoveries of more complete taxa have revealed significant anatomical information previously unavailable due to preservation biases.”

The find provides paleontologists with a greater understanding of the emergence of gigantic sauropod dinosaurs, how they evolved, and how they lived.

It appears numerous sauropod species lived alongside one another, suggesting they occupied different roles in the food web, the scientists said.

“The specimen here reported strongly suggests the co-existence of the largest and middle-sized titanosaurs with small-sized rebbachisaurids (a family of sauropod dinosaurs) at the beginning of the Late Cretaceous in Neuquén Province, indicating putative niche partitioning.”

Sauropod dinosaurs were once widespread, and fossilised remains have been found on every continent on Earth, including Antarctica.

 Because of the partial nature of the find so far, the researchers said that it has not yet been possible to estimate how much MOZ-Pv 1221 would likely have weighed in life. Pictured, an artist's impression of the specimen's silhouette, showing the bones uncovered so far

When early paleontologists first studied the bones of these enormous dinosaurs during the Victorian period, it was commonly thought that due to their size sauropod species were largely water-dwelling animals, however, later research revealed the adaptations which allowed these huge creatures to live on land. These include a system of air sacs, the existence of which are indicated by indentations and cavities in most of the vertebrae, and pneumatic, hollow bones, similar to those of present day birds, which made their huge limbs lighter.

According to the researchers, the Neuquén Province would have been home to numerous sauropod species 98 million years ago — each of which would have occupied a different role, or 'niche', in the ecosystem and food web. Pictured, the team extracts the fossilised remains

The largest animal ever to have existed remains the blue whale, which can reach maximum sizes of 33.5 metres long and weigh 173 tonnes.

Source: www.independent.co.uk/

One-Of-A-Kind Niger Museum Is An Eclectic National ‘Mirror’

Monday, January 18, 2021

A general view of a dinosaur skeleton at the National Museum of Niger (MNN) or Boubou Hama Museum, which is also a zoo, in Niamey, Niger. — AFP pic

There can be few museums in the world to rival the National Museum of Niger.

It has displays covering art, history, dinosaurs, nuclear energy, craftwork and music as well as live animals, for it is also a zoo.

Its clientele is similarly diverse, encompassing visitors who have trekked to the capital Niamey from across the country, school groups, well-heeled foreign tourists and street urchins.

The cultural gem of the world’s poorest country, the 24-hectare (59-acre) museum survives on a budget that for rich counterparts is the equivalent to money found down the back of the sofa.

Yet it charges a rock-bottom entrance fee — around 10 US cents — so that even the most impoverished can walk in and have access to exceptional things... including wild animals. “Fauna and culture,” as the museum says.

“It’s Niger’s mirror, its social and cultural reflection,” said its director, Haladou Mamane, proudly ticking off its strengths in culture, history, archaeology, palaeontology... not forgetting the zoo section, “part of a multi-disciplinary tradition.”

“Here, every Nigerien, regardless of their background, can gain insights about the country,” said Mamane, noting that many people in Niger have never been to school.

Hot and arid, located in the heart of the Sahel, Niger ranks the lowest among 189 countries on the UN’s Human Development Index. Per capita income is just US$1,040 (RM4,200) per year — just over US$2.5 per day, according to the World Bank.

Adding to the burden is a crippling jihadist insurgency. Two, in fact — one coming from the southeast, from Nigeria, and one from the southwest, from Mali.

The state provides the museum with an annual subsidy of 327 million CFA francs (RM2.43 million), and income from the meagre entrance fee of 50 CFA francs covers just about a third of costs.

Street kids’ museum

Before the pandemic, it received more than 100,000 visitors per year, many of them so-called talibe children.

These are children who are unique to West Africa — their parents hand them to a type of Islamic school, where they are supposed to learn the Quran.

But they typically spend their days begging in the dusty streets with a metal receptacle strung around their neck, and many find the museum is a wonderful escape.

One such was 12-year-old Ismael Mariama, who after playing on the slides and seesaws watched a large lion taking an afternoon nap.

“I came to see the animals. I paid 50 francs,” he said, clad in worn, grubby clothes.

“I came from Yantala,” a rundown district in northwestern Niamey, “to come and see the animals, the monkey, the lions, the crocodiles,” he said. 

“I’ve seen everything,” said the lad, before putting his hand between the bars of a cage to give a biscuit to the monkeys.

He added that he had been to the museum’s section on Nigerien craftwork and was interested in the leather shoes.

Mamane said he was especially proud of the craftwork area — a place that provides a shop window for sculptors, painters, potters and leatherworkers, who can sell what they produce.

The artisans come from all over this ethnically diverse country — a sign of “national unity,” said Mamane.

“It’s a bit hard with the coronavirus, but the museum is a good thing for us,” said Ali Abdoulaye, a leatherworker.

“These days, artisans are losing out to cheaper Chinese products — but you buy a (Chinese) handbag, and it falls apart after a couple of days.”

A few metres (yards) from the museum’s main hall is a star attraction — the skeletal remains of three monsters from the Age of the Dinosaurs.

They include Sarcosuchus imperator, an 11m-long crocodile, whose fossil was discovered in the Agadez region by a French palaeontologist, Philippe Taquet.

Makeover

The museum, founded just before Niger gained independence from France in 1960, is planning on a refurbishment and an expansion next year with the help of international donations.

As in many museums around the world, it looks to sponsors for exhibitions.

A show on uranium, Niger’s outstanding mineral wealth, is funded by the French company Orano, previously Areva, whose subsidiaries operate two mines in the south of the country.

Next to it is an exhibition on oil, which has recently been discovered in Niger. The display, which includes an enormous model of a refinery in Zinder, southern Niger, has been funded by the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC). 

The museum promises that once the building work is complete, the 111 species in the zoo will enjoy “improved living conditions”. — AFP

‘Jurassic Park’: A Paleontologist Who Worked On the Movie Could Recreate Real Dinosaurs By 2025

Monday, January 18, 2021

Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, Laura Dern and Sam Neill watch dinosaur eggs hatch in a scene from the film ‘Jurassic Park’, 1993. | Universal/Getty Images

Jurassic Park is a movie that has inspired fans for years, spawning a hugely lucrative franchise that is going strong to this day. Released in 1993, Jurassic Park is based on the novel by science fiction writer Michael Crichton and starred Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, and Richard Attenborough in the leading roles.

Although Jurassic Park is a fictional film, there is a strong scientific undertone to the plot, and many fans, after watching the film, began to wonder if the events portrayed in the movie could actually someday occur. In the years since the film’s release, some scientists, including the one who inspired Sam Neill’s character in the film, have opened up about the possibility of real dinosaurs eventually being recreated. 

What is ‘Jurassic Park’ about?

Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, Laura Dern and Sam Neill watch dinosaur eggs hatch in a scene from the film ‘Jurassic Park’, 1993. | Universal/Getty Images

Jurassic Park tells the story of an eccentric, wealthy businessman named John Hammond, who decides to build the world’s greatest theme park. Hammond’s theme park is built on the fictional island of Isla Nublar, and features a wildlife park of dinosaurs, who are designed and built from DNA sequencing, obtained from prehistoric mosquitos trapped in amber.

To sign off on his park, Hammond flies in a paleontologist, a mathematician, and a paleobotanist, as well as a lawyer, and Hammond’s two grandchildren, determined to experience a fun holiday. However, things quickly start to go wrong, and the dinosaurs slowly begin to take over the park, putting every human on the island in jeopardy.

The film not only featured a gripping storyline but incredible special effects, including life-sized animatronic dinosaurs and groundbreaking CGI imagery. When it was released, it quickly became one of the highest-grossing films of all time, and the years have done nothing to dim its appeal. 

Sam Neill’s character was based on Dr. Jack Horner

Steven Spielberg, the creative force behind the Jurassic Park movie, spared no expense when it came to creating a magical movie experience. He wanted the dinosaurs to be as realistic as possible, so he hired a team of real scientists and paleontologists to have on staff as consultants.

One of the consultants for the film, and reportedly the man that Sam Neill’s Dr. Alan Grant was based on, was paleontologist Dr. Jack Horner. Horner worked not only on the original Jurassic Park film but on many of the other films in the franchise, including Jurassic Park III.

Of course, Horner’s main focus is the world of prehistoric creatures, and he has opened up on several occasions about the possibility of actually recreating dinosaurs in the future. 

Could dinosaurs be recreated by 2025?

In Jurassic Park, Hammond’s team of scientists brought back dinosaurs with the help of preserved DNA encapsulated in amber. While some scientists have stated that it isn’t outrageous to find prehistoric blood in insects trapped in amber, most agree that it is unlikely to actually find enough DNA to recreate dinosaurs.

Dr. Jack Horner even admitted in a 2018 interview that “we can’t clone dinosaurs. We can’t get any of their DNA. Even if we had dinosaur DNA, we don’t know how to actually form an animal just from DNA.”

Still, Horner has said that it is possible to create a “dinosaur-like creature” by splicing and combining different DNA sequences. Horner described the creature as being a cross between a prehistoric dinosaur and a chicken, admitting that “the tail is the biggest project. But on the other hand, we have been able to do some things recently that have given us hope that it won’t take too long.”

The scientist predicted that something could happen by the year 2025 — which, for dinosaur enthusiasts of all ages, is a promising timeline indeed. 

Source: www.cheatsheet.com/

What Movies Get Wrong About Dinosaurs

Sunday, January 17, 2021

Jurassic Park did more for dinosaurs in the movies than any other movie ever has since it made people think that John Hammond’s dream could possibly come true and that perhaps one day the creatures would be a part of the world they’d left behind so long ago. The problem with that is the fact that Jurassic World continued the legacy after two less than stellar Jurassic Park sequels and people are still thinking to this day that the imagination can be brought to life in a very real way no matter that much of what we’ve seen has been debunked and revealed to be little more than a pipe dream that won’t come true no matter how much belief and research are put into it. And if it were possible, then it would take a certifiably insane individual to think that it was a good idea, even for entertainment.

With that in mind, here are a few things that the movies get wrong about dinosaurs.

5. The T.Rex relied solely on sight, and couldn’t ‘see’ you if you didn’t move. With nostrils that big it’s easy to think they had a good sense of smell.

Even if that enormous bugger couldn’t see you, then it’s likely that it’s sense of smell, which is touched upon in The Lost World, would enable the creature to pick up the scent of someone that’s right in front of them. Plus, the creature’s hearing was just fine as one could imagine, and since ‘Lex screamed right before Alan covered her mouth it’s easy to think that the two of them should have been dino chow in the first movie considering their proximity to the T.Rex. Even if they had gotten away, one has to remember that the beast managed to get out of the enclosure, so why wouldn’t it just come in after them?

4. Dinosaurs were all scales and leathery hide. According to paleontologists, there were a lot more feathers involved in the genetics of dinosaurs.

Apparently, this wasn’t found out until around the 90s, but it’s enough to think that the dinosaurs that we used to think of as scaled horrors were actually a lot more colorful and had plenty of plumage about their bodies for various reasons. It does make them look a little silly in some ways, but if the biology fits then it’s hard to argue with since those creatures that have feathers do tend to show as much in various ways. A lot of this feels like the best guess, but when a person spends their life looking at bones and trying to divine just what a creature looked like, it’s usually best to go with those that have put in the work and study.

3. Pterosaurs and Pteranadons could easily pick up humans. Nope, not even close, the weight of a human would be too much.

Even the biggest among them would have had a seriously hard time, and if you watch in Jurassic World, several of these creatures are having a heck of a time getting anyone off the ground without some serious momentum. The problem here is that the added weight of a human being would become dead weight or worse, thrashing, scared, panicked weight that would exert a greater pull on the creature and make the flight even less possible since their wings simply weren’t big enough and despite their musculature they weren’t strong enough to stay aloft with that much weight in their talons. Hunting for fish or small animals is a far cry from a human being.

2. Dinosaur DNA is perfectly viable. 65 million years is a long, LONG time, even for DNA.

Even refrigerated, which would have been possible if an ice age had hit right at the exact time it was needed, wouldn’t have been enough to keep the dino DNA viable for that long. At some point DNA does begin to break down, and even if it takes an extraordinarily long time, the degradation that it would have undergone over the years is likely to have made it even less possible to extract for future use. The science behind it was interesting to think about, but then one might have to think about digging for years upon years to find a wealth of mosquitoes from the right time period and hope that they’d all been snacking on dinosaur blood before they were trapped in amber.

1. The T.Rex could pace a car doing 40 mph for a while. Not really, they could hit about 15 mph, tops.

It’s terrifying to think of something that big being able to move that fast, but in the movie, with the level of bio-engineering they’re capable of, it still feels unlikely since the bigger something is, the less likely it’s going to move that quickly. Plus, when one thinks about it, the prey that a T.Rex would go after were usually larger, slower animals and wouldn’t be moving away that quickly, partially because of their greater mass and partially because they had other ways of defending against an attack.

It’s nice science fantasy, but the science really doesn’t support the idea of dinosaurs as they’re seen in the movies.

Source: www.tvovermind.com/

Dire Wolves Split from Living Canids 5.7 Million Years Ago: Study

Saturday, January 16, 2021

Somewhere in Southwestern North America during the Late Pleistocene, a pack of dire wolves (Canis dirus) are feeding on their bison kill, while a pair of gray wolves (Canis lupus) approach in the hopes of scavenging. One of the dire wolves rushes in to confront the gray wolves, and their confrontation allows a comparison of the bigger, larger-headed and reddish-brown dire wolf with its smaller, gray relative. Image credit: Mauricio Antón / Nature.

Dire wolves (Canis dirus) are considered to be one of the most common and widespread large carnivores in Pleistocene America, yet relatively little is known about their evolution or extinction. Previous analyses, based on morphology alone, had led scientists to believe that these long-extinct canids were closely related to modern gray wolves (Canis lupus). To reconstruct the evolutionary history of dire wolves, an international team of genetic researchers sequenced five genomes from the fossilized remains dating from 12,900 to more than 50,000 years ago. Their results, published in the journal Nature, indicate that dire wolves were a separate lineage that split from living canids around 5.7 million years ago.

Dire wolves were large wolf-like canids — around 68 kg, about 25% heavier than gray wolves — and among the most common extinct large carnivores of the American Late Pleistocene megafauna.

Their remains are present in the North American paleontological record from at least around 250,000 to about 13,000 years ago, at the end of the Pleistocene epoch.

Other canid species that were present in Late Pleistocene North America include the slightly smaller gray wolf, the much smaller coyote (Canis latrans) and the dhole (Cuon alpinus), although dire wolves appear to have been more common overall.

Dire wolves are generally described as a sister species, or even conspecific with, gray wolves.

The leading hypothesis to explain their extinction was that, owing to their larger body size compared with gray wolves and coyotes, dire wolves were more specialized for hunting large prey and were unable to survive the extinction of their megafaunal prey.

“Dire wolves have always been an iconic representation of the last ice age in the Americas and now a pop culture icon thanks to Game of Thrones, but what we know about their evolutionary history has been limited to what we can see from the size and shape of their bones and teeth,” said co-lead author Dr. Angela Perri, a researcher in the Archaeology Department at Durham University.

“With this first ancient DNA analysis of dire wolves we have revealed that the history of dire wolves we thought we knew is actually much more complicated than we previously thought.”

“Instead of being closely related to other North American canids, like gray wolves and coyotes, we found that dire wolves represent a branch that split off from others millions of years ago, representing the last of a now extinct lineage.”

“The terrifying dire wolf, a legendary symbol of Los Angeles and the La Brea Tar Pits, has earned its place among the many large, unique species that went extinct at the end of the Pleistocene epoch,” said co-author Professor Robert Wayne, a researcher in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of California, Los Angeles.

“Dire wolves are sometimes portrayed as mythical creatures — giant wolves prowling bleak frozen landscapes — but reality turns out to be even more interesting,” said co-lead author Dr. Kieren Mitchell, a researcher in the Australian Centre for Ancient DNA at the University of Adelaide.

For the study, the researchers screened 46 sub-fossil specimens of dire wolves for the presence of preserved DNA.

They identified five samples from Idaho, Ohio, Tennessee and Wyoming, dating to between 12,900 and more than 50,000 years ago, that possessed sufficient DNA to obtain both mitochondrial and nuclear genome sequences.

They found no evidence for the flow of genes between dire wolves and either North American gray wolves or coyotes.

The absence of any genetic transference indicates that dire wolves evolved in isolation from the Ice Age ancestors of these other species.

“We have found the dire wolf is not closely related to the gray wolf,” said co-author Dr. Alice Mouton, a researcher in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of California, Los Angeles.

“Further we show that the dire wolf never interbred with the gray wolf. In contrast, gray wolves, African wolves, dogs, coyotes and jackals can and do interbreed.”

“Dire wolves likely diverged from gray wolves more than 5 million years ago, which was a great surprise that this divergence occurred so early. This finding highlights how special and unique the dire wolf was.”

The ancestors of gray wolves and much smaller coyotes evolved in Eurasia and are thought to have moved into North America less than 1.37 million years ago, relatively recently in evolutionary time.

The dire wolf, on the other hand, based on its genetic difference from those species, is now believed to have originated in the Americas.

The authors also suggest the dire wolves’ stark evolutionary divergence from gray wolves places them in an entirely different genus, Aenocyon, as first proposed by paleontologist John Campbell Merriam over 100 years ago.

“When we first started this study, we thought that dire wolves were just beefed-up gray wolves, so we were surprised to learn how extremely genetically different they were, so much so that they likely could not have interbred,” said senior author Professor Laurent Frantz, a researcher in the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences at Queen Mary University of London and the Department of Veterinary Sciences at Ludwig Maximilian University.

“This must mean that dire wolves were isolated in North America for a very long time to become so genetically distinct.”

_____

A.R. Perri et al. Dire wolves were the last of an ancient New World canid lineage. Nature, published online January 13, 2021; doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-03082-x

Source: www.sci-news.com/

Asteracanthus ornatissimus: Well-Preserved Fossil of Jurassic-Period Shark Unearthed in Germany

Saturday, January 16, 2021

Tentative life reconstruction of the hybodontiform shark Asteracanthus ornatissimus. Image credit: Sebastian Stumpf / Fabrizio De Rossi.

An international team of paleontologists from Austria and Switzerland has uncovered an exceptionally well-preserved skeleton of Asteracanthus ornatissimus, a species of hybodontiform shark that lived about 150 million years ago (Jurassic period), in the famous limestones of Solnhofen in Germany.

Hybodontiform sharks are the closest relatives of modern sharks and rays,” said University of Vienna’s Dr. Sebastian Stumpf and colleagues.

“They first appeared in the latest Devonian, about 361 million years ago, survived two of the big five Phanerozoic mass extinction events, and finally became extinct at the end of the Cretaceous, about 66 million years ago.”

“These sharks had two dorsal fins, each supported by a prominent fin spine.”

“Their body size ranged from a few centimeters to approximately 3 m (10 feet) in maximum length, which consequently makes Asteracanthus one of the largest representatives of both its group and its time.”

“In contrast, modern sharks and rays, which were already diverse during the Jurassic, only reached a body size of up to 2 m (6.6 feet) in maximum length in very rare cases.”

Asteracanthus ornatissimus from the lower Tithonian of Solnhofen, Bavaria, Germany: (A) interpretative line drawing; (B) slab containing specimen; (C) close-up view of anterior dorsal fin spine; (D) close-up view of posterior dorsal fin spine; (E) tentative life reconstruction of female Asteracanthus ornatissimus. Abbreviations: adfs – anterior dorsal fin spine, af – anal fin, bv – basiventral, cf – caudal fin, ebr – epibranchial, lal – lateral line, Mc – Meckel’s cartilage, nc – neurocranium, notc – notochord, pcf – pectoral fin, pdfs – posterior dorsal fin spine, plr – pleural rib, pq – palatoquadrate, pvf – pelvic fin, scc – scapulacoracoid. Scale bars – 50 cm in (A, B) and 10 cm in (C, D). Image credit: Stumpf et al., doi: 10.1002/spp2.1350.

In the new research, the paleontologists examined a new, exceptionally well-preserved skeleton of Asteracanthus ornatissimus with dentition and fin spines from the Solnhofen limestones.

Asteracanthus was scientifically described more than 180 years ago by the Swiss-American naturalist Louis Agassiz on the basis of isolated fossil dorsal fin spines,” they said.

“However, articulated skeletal remains have never been found — until now.”

According to the team, the dentition of Asteracanthus ornatissimus contained more than 150 teeth, each with a well-developed central cusp that was accompanied on both sides by several smaller cusplets.

“This specialized type of dentition suggests that Asteracanthus was an active predator feeding on a wide range of prey animals,” Dr. Stumpf said.

Asteracanthus was certainly not only one of the largest cartilaginous fishes of its time, but also one of the most impressive.”

The findings were published in the journal Papers in Palaeontology.

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Sebastian Stumpf et al. A unique hybodontiform skeleton provides novel insights into Mesozoic chondrichthyan life. Papers in Palaeontology, published online January 13, 2021; doi: 10.1002/spp2.1350

Source: http://www.sci-news.com/

Jurassic Park & World: The 5 Worst Things That The Dinosaurs Did (& 5 Best)

Thursday, January 14, 2021

Dinosaurs have been a box office draw since Jurassic Park's initial release. But what are the dinos best moments throughout the entire franchise?

In 1993, Steven Spielberg and his team made the world believe dinosaurs made been brought back to life and since then the Jurassic Park franchise has thrilled audiences worldwide. Between the original trilogy and the new Jurassic World movies, fans have gotten a lot of dino action over the years.

Part of the fun is the chaos these ancient monsters can cause in the modern world, which can often be terrifying and brutal. However, even though they can be scary at times, there are moments that show these dinosaurs can actually be helpful and are not just about eating people.

10 - Worst: T-Rex Eats A Dog

Though it is not as flawless as the original movie, Lost World: Jurassic Park is much better than its reputation suggests. However, one of the aspects people seem to have the biggest issue with is the climax, in which a T-Rex runs amok in San Diego.

The sequence is admittedly silly and also features one of the most horrific moments in the series. When the T-Rex is getting a drink from a backyard swimming pool, a dog begins barking at it. When the family comes to investigate, they find the T-Rex swallowing what's left of their poor pet.

9 - Best: Dilophosaurus Stops Nedry

The dinosaurs certainly cause most of the damage in these movies, but there are always human characters who are the real villains. In the original Jurassic Park, Dennis Nedry is the greedy computer programmer who steals the dino DNA to sell to competing businesses.

As viewers have seen in subsequent movies, that DNA in the wrong hands could be really dangerous. Therefore, it was a good thing that Dennis crashes his Jeep while fleeing the park and that the Dilophosaurus decided to have a snack, thus preventing the DNA from getting out in the world.

8 - Worst: Compsognathus Attack Little Girl

Jurassic Park movies remind viewers that not all dinosaurs look scary, but they also tell fans that looks can be deceiving. The opening scene of Lost World: Jurassic Park finds a rich family accidentally stumbling onto the island during a yachting trip.

The young daughter of the family wanders off and encounters an adorable small dino known as Compsognathus and proceeds to feed it. Unfortunately, she failed to know that they hunt in packs, and soon dozens show up and attack her. Though she lives, it is a scary scene that shows these dinos are ruthless regardless of age.

7 - Best: T-Rex Kills Mills

Though it is not right to cheer on someone getting eaten alive by a dinosaur, there are some characters who really do deserve it. The villainous Mills in Jurassic Park: Fallen Kingdom has the distinction of being the only human character to kill someone in these movies, so it's obvious he is a bad guy.

After Mills imprisons a little girl and tries to kill the heroes, he auctions dinosaurs off to some dangerous people. After the dinos inevitably escape, Mills gets his comeuppance when he is eaten by a T-Rex.

6 - Worst: The Death Of Zara

The Jurassic Park movies have always been reasonably subtle with their gore, never going too over-the-top. However, in Jurassic World, one death scene is so drawn out and torturous that it may be the darkest moment in the series.

Zara is the babysitter who is tasked with looking after Gray and Zach while they visit the park. Though she allows them to sneak away, that hardly makes her deserving of the death that follows. She is snatched up by a Pteranodon, dropped into a pool, snatched up again, then eaten by a Mosasaurus.

5 - Best: T-Rex Fights Indominus Rex

It seems like each Jurassic Park movie needs to introduce a new, more powerful dinosaur. In Jurassic World, the genetically engineered Indominus Rex fills that role and is quite a formidable beast. But it is no match for the original queen of Jurassic Park.

As the Indominus Rex threatens the heroes, they decide the logical thing would be to free the T-Rex and let it fight the Indominus. The T-Rex even teams up with the raptors and the Mosasaurus to get the job done.

4 - Worst: Indominus Rex Kills For Sport

In order to make this Indominus Rex a more effective dino villain, the filmmakers needed it to be even more bloodthirsty than the other dinosaurs that came before.

As Owen and Claire track the Indominus Rex's path of destruction through the park, they find a herd of Apatosaurus that have been slaughtered. Own notes that the Indominus didn't eat them, but rather killed them purely for the sport.

3 - Best: Blue Fights Indoraptor

One of the most controversial aspects of the Jurassic World movies has been the idea that the vicious and terrifying raptors can somehow be trained. Owen Grady trains the raptors from birth and they seem to see him as a father figure.

Owen has a special connection to one of the raptors named Blue, who is captured along with some other dinos in Fallen Kingdom. But when the newly designed Indoraptor threatens Owen, Blue steps in for a dino-fight and kills the evil Indoraptor.

2 - Worst: Two T-Rex Eat Eddie Carr

Eddie Carr was introduced as a member of the small team that John Hammond sent to the second island in Lost World. He is a valuable member of the team and an all-around nice guy. So it was a real bummer to see him die in such a brutal way.

As Eddie valiantly tries to rescue his friends from falling off a cliff, two T-Rexes show up to complicate the situation. Even as the dinos close in on him, Eddie continues with the rescue mission. While he saves the others, the hungry dinosaurs tear him in two.

1 - Best: T-Rex Saves The Day

The unforgettable sequence of the T-Rex breaking out of the confinement in the original movie and attacking the Jeeps instantly made it one of the most effective and scary movie monsters of all time. And yet, fans still cheered for it when the T-Rex came back to save the day.

At the climax of the movie, the heroes find themselves surrounded by raptors that are ready to attack. Suddenly out of nowhere, the T-Rex shows up and begins devouring the raptors, allowing the humans to escape.

Source: https://screenrant.com/

Jurassic Park 2: How The T-Rex Killed The Ship Crew

Thursday, January 14, 2021

Jurassic Park 2 has a confusing plot hole in how the T-Rex killed the ship’s crew while trapped in the cargo hold—but this query does have a solution.

Jurassic Park 2 has a handful of plot holes, none of which is more confusing than how the T-Rex killed the ship’s entire crew while still trapped in the cargo hold. Released in 1997, The Lost World was the much-anticipated first sequel to Jaws director Stephen Spielberg’s 1993 blockbuster Jurassic ParkJurassic Park had a fairly perfect ending and was adored by both audiences and critics alike upon release. So fans were understandably cautious about the prospect of a sequel, although the news that Spielberg (who generally eschewed sequels) had opted to return to the director’s chair was promising. Unfortunately, despite some nail-biting set pieces, The Lost World was an inconsistent and overlong installment in the Jurassic Park canon.

Fortunately, the sequel was elevated by superb supporting turns from the likes of Pete Postlethwaite and Peter Stormare, as well as some great set pieces like the deeply creepy opening scene and the memorably wild final chase through San Diego. But it's this stellar action-packed closing scene that features the movie’s most egregious plot hole. The T-rex rampages through San Diego after arriving in the bay by ship from the Five Deaths archipelago. She bursts free from the cargo hold when the movie’s stars find the crew slaughtered on board, but if the T-Rex was confined to the cargo hold until arriving in the bay, who - or what - killed the crew? The answer has confused movie fans for decades now, with many Lost World theories circulating online among the Jurassic Park fandom.

The consensus is that a scene may have gone missing somewhere between script and screen, whether it was due to censorship, rewrites, or clumsy editing. Thus, the actual answer appears to be that the T-Rex wasn’t originally trapped in the cargo hold, and killed the crew in the process of them attempting to trap her after her initial escape. Viewers can see the wreckage of a broken cage, which the T-Rex can be assumed to have torn her way out of some time after leaving Site B, and so the most logical assumption is that she proceeded to off the crew as they attempted to trap her inside the cargo hold, only for her to retreat to the cargo hold and become trapped inside because she was likely following her scared offspring.

This isn't to say this is the only theory on how this scenario occurred, however, as there are a wide array of fan thoughts on how this all could have gone down, ranging from entirely plausible to downright impossible. Some fans think the crew visited the cargo hold one-by-one to be picked off by the T-Rex Agatha Christie-style, and others think that the captain left his hands on the steering wheel before checking in on the hungry T-Rex. More sensible suggestions from Jurassic Park viewers include a cut sequence where rampaging raptors pick off the crew. But this answer only amounts to kicking the can down the road, as the plot hole then becomes “so where did the raptors go?” making the theory that the T-Rex killed the crew and was then trapped the more likely version of events.

It’s a relatively neat explanation to this infamous plot hole that ensures Jurassic Park: The Lost World makes sense again - at least until viewers start wondering how the ship piloted itself to shore without a crew, or how the massive T-Rex managed to fit her colossal head inside the small room the captain’s severed hand is found in.

Source: https://screenrant.com/

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