Biology Ancient Australia (Extinct Megafauna, Dinosaurs etc)

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Not Australian but very interesting. A magnificent 520 million y.o. fossil of Kylinxia zhangia. A three-eyed arthropod that may fill a gap in animal evolution and even comes with a Simpsons reference. This is the early Cambrian period, about 20 million years after the End-Ediacaran extinction when we finally got rid of all those silly frondy things and start to see mobile, complex and mature body plans, in many cases similar to animals today. - or perhaps animals as god meant them!

Ancient three-eye insect relative fills animal evolution gap

A 520-million-year-old fossil of a relative of insects with three eyes fills a gap in our understanding of how arthropods evolved.

cosmosmagazine.com

 

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This paper is co-authored by my friend Peter Trusler and is indeed about extinct Australia fauna - the very first in fact, the Ediacaran fauna, weird frondy animals named after the place they were first found, Ediacara SA. There are some magnificent specimens in the SA museum and if you ever visit Adelaide (yes, I know its unlikely) then you should go and see them.



Non-technical Summary.—Large, soft-bodied fronds were among the first large and complex creatures that evolved on our planet, and these fronds dominated the seas during the latter half of the Ediacaran Period (575–538 million years ago), which immediately preceded the Cambrian. Some of the first Ediacaran fronds described were found in the Flinders Ranges of Australia. A frond named Rangea longa by Martin Glaessner and Mary Wade in 1966, which was nearly half a meter long, is unique in almost always appearing on the top of the bed that contains it. The morphologies of the specimens they described were variable, which hindered global understanding of how many types were present and the time range that each morphology exhibited. Our study of all specimens ever discovered shows that Glaessner and Wade were correct in concluding that all these specimens belonged to the same species, and superb preservation of these fronds shows that the variation we see among these fossils reflects which side of the frond faced up and what angle it lay on the sea floor when it died. These fronds represent a new genus called Akrophyllas (literally “the frond on the top” in ancient Greek). Akrophyllas lived as an erect frond that was firmly anchored to the shallow sea floor by a bulbous holdfast, and died when it was buried by sand during a storm

The article is really one for the scholars:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/1A0B292F3E59E0054E3E6D60E0B9A5AC/S0022336023000458a.pdf/elongate-ediacaran-fronds-from-the-flinders-ranges-south-australia.pdf

 

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RNA has been recovered from the Thylacine

Scientists Recover RNA From an Extinct Species for the First Time

A team of researchers managed to isolate and sequence century-old RNA from the thylacine, also known as the Tasmanian tiger.

gizmodo.com

De-extinction here we come (maybe)

 

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Belgian scientists have modelled the behaviour of the 2 Giga tonnes of dust kicked off by the asteroid impact that caused the Cretaceous extinction.

'According to the simulations, dust of the size found in Dakota could have remained in the atmosphere for up to 15 years after being blasted into the sky. By blocking out the sun’s rays, up to 2,000bn tonnes of it could have shut down photosynthesis for nearly two years and cooled the planet by up to 15C.'

Dust drove dinosaurs’ extinction after asteroid impact, scientists say

Researchers ran simulations to explore the ‘killing mechanisms’ that wiped out 75% of species

www.theguardian.com

There is evidence of fern growth about 1000 years after the impact, I don't know of any finer dating of events post impact. A nuclear winter scenario over years seems very likely, but how long?

 

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Not extinct anymore - Attenborough's Long Beaked Echinda has been caught on a trail cam in West Papua near the border with PNG.

Long-beaked echidna rediscovered in remote Papua mountains after 60 years

Scientists rediscover a long-lost species of mammal described as having the spines of a hedgehog, the snout of an anteater and the feet of a mole, in Papua's Cyclops Mountains more than 60 years after it was last recorded.

www.abc.net.au

 

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This could be a very significant discovery, 2.4 billion year old microfossils from WA may be the earliest Eukaryotic life. That's the time we oxygen breathers call the Great Oxygenation Event, when this party we call life really kicked on. The anaerobic organisms have a different view, to them it was The Great Poisoning.

Breathtaking Discovery: Unearthing Microfossils That Redefine Life’s Evolution

Microfossils found in Western Australia suggest a significant leap in life's complexity during the Great Oxidation Event, hinting at the early evolution of complex organisms like algae. Microfossils from Western Australia may capture a jump in the complexity of life that coincided with the rise o

scitechdaily.com

 

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This one is Australian and is extinct. Crytopgyps lacertosus, a vulture, gathered from the submerged Green Waterhole at Tantanoola in South Australia's south east. These guys died out with the extinction of megafauna about 50,000 years ago in the Pleistocene era. The story is with loss of the marsupial megafauna there was less carrion for a big scavenger like this. There is some nice artwork by John Barrie, a South Australian artist and natural historian.

Primitive, heavy-boned and reliant on megafauna, the sad story of Australia's only vulture

Vultures are found everywhere in the world today, except Australia and Antarctica. But that hasn't always been the case.

www.abc.net.au

 

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RNA has been recovered from the Thylacine

Scientists Recover RNA From an Extinct Species for the First Time

A team of researchers managed to isolate and sequence century-old RNA from the thylacine, also known as the Tasmanian tiger.

gizmodo.com

De-extinction here we come (maybe)

I saw some of the rock art at Burrup earlier this year. One was a clear image of a thylacine. Supposedly went extinct on the mainland about 3000 years ago. Would have been much earlier in the Pilbara I reckon,

 

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I saw some of the rock art at Burrup earlier this year. One was a clear image of a thylacine. Supposedly went extinct on the mainland about 3000 years ago. Would have been much earlier in the Pilbara I reckon,

Yes, probably earlier than down south. I've never been Burrup, was it interesting? Don't let Rio Tinto know about it because they have shown a penchant for blowing these anthropological sites up.

 

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We haven't had many whale fossils found in Oz, but a recent find is a beauty that may rewrite the history of whale evolution. The as yet unnamed Murray River Baleen whale specimen was found by F.A. Cudmore (on 15 February 1921) eroding from limestone cliffs on the east bank of the Murray River, about 5 km south of Devon Downs, South Australia. For a century it sat undiscovered in the MOV storage.

A Murray River fossil rewrites the history of earth’s biggest creatures

The pale-white slab was locked away for a century. New analysis has redefined the history of the ocean and all the creatures that depend on it – including humans.

www.smh.com.au

Baleen whales were thought to have evolved only 4-5 million years ago based largely on evidence from the northern hemisphere. This find is much older, and the authors suggest baleen whales actually evolved in the southern hemisphere and are at least 17 million years old. Original paper here - https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2023.2177

 

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End of the year time brings us those 'Best of 2023' lists, this one looks a dinosaur finds/publication for the year.

10 jaw-dropping dinosaur fossils unearthed in 2023

From a teenage tyrannosaur's last meal to a fossilized voice box and a cliff covered in footprints, here are the 10 best dinosaur fossils unearthed this year.

www.livescience.com

My favourite is the least spectacular, but perhaps the most significant, the first-ever non-avian dinosaur larynx ever found, from an ankylosaur, Pinacosaurus grangeri. Guess what, it looks a lot like a birds larynx.

 

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Yes, probably earlier than down south. I've never been Burrup, was it interesting? Don't let Rio Tinto know about it because they have shown a penchant for blowing these anthropological sites up.

It was incredible. I doubt I'll ever see art as old as that again. We weren't there anywhere near long enough, even though it was stinking hot.

Not to excuse Rio. Juukan Gorge was significant but in no way comparable to Burrup.

 

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It was incredible. I doubt I'll ever see art as old as that again. We weren't there anywhere near long enough, even though it was stinking hot.

Not to excuse Rio. Juukan Gorge was significant but in no way comparable to Burrup.

Sounds fascinating, I may try to go there in the next couple years. How difficult is access? I have a bog standard pajero, would that be good enough to travel through the peninsula?

 

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Sounds fascinating, I may try to go there in the next couple years. How difficult is access? I have a bog standard pajero, would that be good enough to travel through the peninsula?

You won't have any trouble with access. We were at a little tourist set-up with a boardwalk around some of the rocks. There were a couple of guides pointing out and telling us about the carvings.

Rock piles like the one we were at are scattered all over the place like the earth spewed them up. Weird landscape.

There's apparently about a million petroglyphs on those rocks.

 

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Megalodon was warm blooded according to these scientists who used dental isotopes.

Megalodon Was No Cold-Blooded Killer – And That Spelled Its Doom

A killer, yes. But analysis of tooth minerals reveals how the warm-blooded predator maintained its body temperature. Researchers have determined that the extinct megalodon shark was warm-blooded, able to maintain its body temperature higher than the surrounding water. However, the energy needed f

scitechdaily.com

Obligatory massive jawed shark pic.........

This is not surprising. A few fish and sharks are 'warm blooded' (endothermic), usually high performance animals, for example Tuna and the Great White Shark are both endothermic.

 

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Evidence from 1.7 billion year old microfossils from the McDermott Formation in the Northern Territory of cell structures (thylakoids) used for photosynthesis. I think this is the earliest direct evidence of photosynthetic structures in microfossils, the rise in oxygen levels started a bit earlier at about 2.6 billion years ago.

Category: Science

Science &

arstechnica.com

 

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Not an Australian site, the Cleveland Shale has some of the most magnificent late Devonian fossils, most well known is the apex predator Dunkleosteus, a 7m long monster with a face from hell.

This video below has a lot of other interesting fossils, a club moss, sharks experimenting with weird headgear and a poor placoderm that was attempting to have lunch with a spiny shark and instead managed to get the sharks spine go through its palate and into it's brain. Unlucky but most folks who end up as fossils have suffered terminal bad luck. There is enough material to get a good idea of the ecology of the area. More sharks than Placoderms in these beds, already they were in decline despite the presence of Dunkleosteus. The boney fish already look like modern boney fish.

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Harajicadipterus youngi was a fish in the Tetrapodomorpha group, these were a group of lobe finned fishes that eventually took to land. Harajicadipterus had been only known from bits and piece found amongst thousands of placoderms in the Middle-Late Devonian Harajica Sandstone on Luritja/Arrernte country, 150 kilometres west of Alice Springs. A Flinders University expedition to the site in 2016 yielded the first almost complete fossil, it's a real beaut, there is a picture in the article.

A 380-million-year old predatory fish from Central Australia is finally named after decades of digging

For decades, the sandstone in central Australia yielded tantalising segments of some sort of fossil fish. Now, we have finally pieced together a complete picture of this remarkable species.

theconversation.com

 

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Not an Australian find, Garzapelta muelleriould, a new armoured crocodile (aetosaur) from the Triassic. Another case of finding some old specimens in a draw. It's an ankylosaur body design 100 million years before ankylosaurs.
https://phys.org/news/2024-03-tanks-triassic-crocodile-ancestor.html
Early Crocs evolved many forms, including bipedal forms and armoured forms like this. They were worthy competitors with the dino's in the Triassic, but as the Mesozoic continued the Dino's came to dominate. In some ways our current crocs are 'degenerate' compared to their ancestors, becoming sprawling, low metabolic rate ectotherms who only hung around swamps. They did have the last laugh after that big comet hit.

 

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We haven't had many whale fossils found in Oz, but a recent find is a beauty that may rewrite the history of whale evolution. The as yet unnamed Murray River Baleen whale specimen was found by F.A. Cudmore (on 15 February 1921) eroding from limestone cliffs on the east bank of the Murray River, about 5 km south of Devon Downs, South Australia. For a century it sat undiscovered in the MOV storage.

A Murray River fossil rewrites the history of earth’s biggest creatures

The pale-white slab was locked away for a century. New analysis has redefined the history of the ocean and all the creatures that depend on it – including humans.

www.smh.com.au

Baleen whales were thought to have evolved only 4-5 million years ago based largely on evidence from the northern hemisphere. This find is much older, and the authors suggest baleen whales actually evolved in the southern hemisphere and are at least 17 million years old. Original paper here - https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2023.2177

i recently did a guided tour of the area these bones were found. Magnificent place and it is the site of the first indigenous archaeological site in australia, Ngaut Ngaut Conservation park. The rock carvings are amazing depiciting animals, sun and moon, boomerang .

 

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From the UK, Icthyiotitan, the largest ichthyosaur so far, found by. Ruby Reynolds, who was 11 when she found the fossil on the beach Only known by 2 pieces of jaw bone, this critter has been estimated to be 22 to 26m long, however these size guesstimates when based on a couple of bones are often wrong.

Gigantic marine reptile identified from fossil found by 11-year-old girl and father

A fossil jawbone found by a young girl and her father on a beach in England belongs to a gigantic marine reptile dating back to 202 million years ago that appears to have been among the largest animals ever on Earth.

www.abc.net.au

 

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The plan to turn the South Australian museum into a theme park and cut the science done there is at least getting some press.

‘It could be the death of the museum’: why research cuts at a South Australian institution have scientists up in arms

Experts say the ‘reimagining’ of the South Australian Museum will destroy its crucial contributions to science.

theconversation.com

Even my friend Dr Trusler wrote a letter. I have tried to raise this act of cultural vandalism in as many forums as I can. If you are from SA please make some noise about it, hassle your MP or the politicians involved. The museum has some truly unique collections, preventing researchers access to them is simply a crime.

 

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The plan to turn the South Australian museum into a theme park and cut the science done there is at least getting some press.

‘It could be the death of the museum’: why research cuts at a South Australian institution have scientists up in arms

Experts say the ‘reimagining’ of the South Australian Museum will destroy its crucial contributions to science.

theconversation.com

Even my friend Dr Trusler wrote a letter. I have tried to raise this act of cultural vandalism in as many forums as I can. If you are from SA please make some noise about it, hassle your MP or the politicians involved. The museum has some truly unique collections, preventing researchers access to them is simply a crime.

Disgusting and disappointing, amazingly the government can find $20 million to help build a sports stadium in the barossa!!!!

 

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Disgusting and disappointing, amazingly the government can find $20 million to help build a sports stadium in the barossa!!!!

Yes, got to get your priorities right. SA Museum has some totally unique collections of special importance to the world; the Ediacaran fossils, the marsupial megafauna and parts of the anthropological collection. Nothing else like them in existence and these guys want to cut scientific access. Really stuffed.

 

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Yes, got to get your priorities right. SA Museum has some totally unique collections of special importance to the world; the Ediacaran fossils, the marsupial megafauna and parts of the anthropological collection. Nothing else like them in existence and these guys want to cut scientific access. Really stuffed.

I've just recently found out i can volunteer my time online and transcribe botany specimen data sheets from the sa museum so they have a digital record of them, it's very interesting to go through.