Paleontology News

Ancient Protein Analysis Sheds New Light on Rhino Family Tree

A paleoartist’s reconstruction of the three extinct species whose genomes were sequenced by Liu et al.: in the foreground is a Siberian unicorn (Elasmotherium sibiricum), and close behind are two Merck’s rhinoceroses (Stephanorhinus kirchbergensis); in the far background is a woolly rhinoceros (Coelodonta antiquitatis). Image credit: Beth Zaiken.
Jul 10, 2025 by News Staff

Paleontologists have retrieved ancient enamel protein sequences from a fossilized tooth of Epiaceratherium sp., a rhinocerotid that lived in Canada’s High Arctic between 24 and 21 million years ago (Early Miocene). The recovered sequences allowed the researchers to determine that this ancient rhino diverged from other rhinocerotids during the Middle Eocene-Oligocene epoch, around 41-25 million years ago. The new data also shed new light on the divergence...

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An artist’s restoration of Novaculadon mirabilis. Image credit: Hamzah Imran.

New Species of Multituberculate Mammal Discovered in UK

Jul 10, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

Paleontologists have discovered the fossilized dental remains from a new genus and species of plagiaulacid multituberculate in the Lower Cretaceous Lulworth...

The Turkana Basin within the East African Rift System preserves fossil assemblages that date back more than 66 million years; Green et al. collected powdered samples for paleoproteomic analysis from the dense interiors of enamel from large herbivores from the Early Pleistocene back to the Oligocene (29 million years). Image credit: Green et al., doi: 10.1038/s41586-025-09040-9.

Paleontologists Find Ancient Proteins in 18-Million-Year-Old Mammal Tooth Enamel

Jul 9, 2025 by News Staff

Paleontologists have discovered protein sequences within dense enamel tissues of ancient rhinocerotid and proboscidean fossils collected at sites of Buluk...

An artist’s reconstruction of Eotephradactylus mcintireae, other animals, and plants found preserved in a remote bonebed in Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona, the United States. Image credit: Brian Engh.

Unusual Bonebed in Arizona Reveals North America’s Earliest-Known Pterosaur

Jul 8, 2025 by News Staff

Paleontologists have unearthed the fossilized jawbone of a new pterosaur species alongside hundreds of other fossils — including one of the world’s...

Life reconstruction of Zhongyuansaurus junchangi. Image credit: Connor Ashbridge / CC BY 4.0.

New Species of Armored Dinosaur Identified in China

Jul 7, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

Paleontologists have described a new species of the ankylosaurid dinosaur genus Zhongyuansaurus using a specimen found in China’s Henan province. Life...

This lithograph shows Loligo forbesii, a species of squid in the order Myopsida. Image credit: Comingio Merculiano.

Study: Squids Originated and Rapidly Radiated by 100 Million Years Ago

Jul 1, 2025 by News Staff

Using an innovative digital fossil-mining approach, paleontologists analyzed more than 250 fossil beaks from 40 ancient squid species. Their results suggest...

An artist’s reconstruction of Yinshanosaurus angustus. Image credit: X.-C. Guo, Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology.

New Species of Permian Herbivorous Tetrapod Identified in China

Jun 30, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

Paleontologists have identified a new genus and species of mid-sized pareiasaur from two fossilized specimes found in China in 2018. An artist’s reconstruction...

Australian magpies (Gymnorhina tibicen), adult and juvenile, at Taveuni, Fiji. Image credit: Charles J. Sharp, https://www.sharpphotography.co.uk / CC BY-SA 4.0.

19-Million-Year-Old Currawong Fossil Found in New Zealand

Jun 27, 2025 by News Staff

Paleontologists have desribed a new species of large passerine bird based the fossilized remains from the Bannockburn Formation near St Bathans in Otago,...

Ecological reconstruction of Cretaceous insects and insect-pathogenic fungi. An ant is discarding an infected pupa, and an infected fly is located on a distant tree trunk. Image credit: Zhuang et al., doi: 10.1098/rspb.2025.0407.

Two Species of Parasitic Fungi Found in 99-Million-Year-Old Amber

Jun 27, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

These fossil fungi from mid-Cretaceous Kachin amber are from the same family as the zombie-ant fungus Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, which has gained widespread...

A reconstruction of early Cambrian ocean life in South China. Image credit: Dongjing Fu.

Cambrian Explosion Occurred Millions of Years Earlier than Previously Thought: Study

Jun 26, 2025 by News Staff

Paleontologists have analyzed the body profiles of Ediacaran-Cambrian organisms by using trace fossils as proxies for body fossils. A reconstruction of...

Life reconstruction of Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae. Image credit: Bob Nicholls.

Dog-Sized Neornithischian Dinosaur Unearthed in Colorado

Jun 26, 2025 by News Staff

A remarkable new genus and species of neornithischian dinosaur being named Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae has been identified from a three-dimensionally...

Life reconstruction of Swaindelphys. Image credit: Kristen Tietjen.

New Species of Metatherian Mammal Unearthed in Texas

Jun 24, 2025 by News Staff

Members of the metatherian genus Swaindelphys were previously known from Swain Quarry in south-central Wyoming and the Nacimiento Formation in the San...

An artist’s reconstruction of Litoria tylerantiqua (right) and the previously-described species Platyplectrum casca (left) from Murgon, south-eastern Queensland. Image: Samantha Yabsley, https://www.instagram.com/s.h.y_art.

55-Million-Year-Old Tree Frog Fossil Unearthed in Australia

Jun 20, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

The discovery of Litoria tylerantiqua suggests that Australian treefrogs (pelodryadids) were present in Australia by the Early Eocene, when the continent...

An artist’s impression of a ‘Snowball Earth.’ Image credit: NASA.

Early Complex Life May Have Sheltered in Meltwater Ponds during Snowball Earth Episodes: Study

Jun 19, 2025 by News Staff

During periods known as Snowball Earth, between 720 and 635 million years ago, early eukaryotes — complex cellular lifeforms that eventually evolved...

Life reconstruction of Bolg amondol. Image credit: Cullen Townsend.

Armored, Large-Bodied Lizards Lived alongside Dinosaurs in Cretaceous North America

Jun 18, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

New fossilized specimens of monstersaurs — including a previously unknown genus and species, Bolg amondol — from the Kaiparowits Formation...

An artist’s rendition of Quetzalcoatlus northropi. Image credit: James Kuether.

Warm and Humid Climate Conditions Set Stage for Pterosaurs to Take to Skies 220 Million Years Ago

Jun 18, 2025 by News Staff

In new research, paleontologists combined data on the distribution of Triassic pterosauromorph (pterosaur + lagerpetid) fossils with information on the...

Diagram of the Plateosaurus trossingensis skeleton as part of the Teoplati exhibit at the Natural History Museum of the University of Zurich. Image credit: Dupuis et al., doi: 10.1186/s13358-025-00368-3.

Triassic Sauropodomorph Dinosaur Suffered from Severe Bone Tissue Infection

Jun 17, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

A ream of paleontologists at the University of Zurich reports a chronic case of osteomyelitis (bone tissue infection) in Plateosaurus trossingensis, one...

Excavation of Fernatator prenticei’s skeleton. Note that the rostrum is incomplete, although it preserves an additional portion that has since been lost. T. Prentice at right, W. R. Wilson, general manager of the C.N.P. Coal Company, at left. Photo taken circa 1916, Elk River, between Morrissey and Fernie, British Columbia. Photographer unknown. Image credit: Massare et al.

Paleontologists Identify Fossil from British Columbia as Early Jurassic Ichthyosaur

Jun 16, 2025 by Enrico de Lazaro

A partial skeleton found in the Fernie Formation in British Columbia, Canada, back in 1916 represents a new genus and species of an extinct marine reptile...

Diversity of extinct mammals that inhabited the surroundings of Lake Tagua Tagua, Chile. Image credit: Mauricio Álvarez.

South American Mastodons Regularly Consumed Fruits, Study Suggests

Jun 13, 2025 by News Staff

Most megafaunal herbivores in the Americas went extinct around 10,000 years ago, presumably disrupting the long-distance seed dispersal of large, fleshy-fruited...

An AI impression of the Tumat Puppies. Image credit: Gemini AI.

14,000-Year-Old ‘Tumat Puppies’ from Siberian Permafrost Are Not Early Dogs, New Analysis Shows

Jun 12, 2025 by News Staff

The Tumat Puppies, two permafrost-preserved Late Pleistocene canids, have been hypothesized to have been littermates and early domesticated dogs due to...

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