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Algae assassin found responsible for whale mass grave in Chile
It has all the hallmarks of a paleontological crime scene: a massive graveyard along a remote desert highway containing the fossil bones of at least 40 dead whales and a slew of other marine victims....
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One Scary Chicken—New species of large, feathered dinosaur discovered
Finding a fossil is the first step, recognizing it for what it truly is, is the real challenge. While closely studying three fossil skeletons from museum collections a team of scientists from the...
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Discover sloths in a whole new way!
Here at Smithsonian Science we are celebrating Sloth Week with four little-known facts about sloths, some of which we found in the Smithsonian’s very own collections! 1. The Smithsonian has a...
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Human Evolution Rewritten: We owe our existence to our ancestor’s flexible...
Many traits unique to humans were long thought to have originated in the genus Homo between 2.4 and 1.8 million years ago in Africa. A large brain, long legs and the ability to craft tools along with...
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Five amazing fossil finds that will make you want to be a fossil hunter
Smithsonian intern Catalina Suarez Gomez excavating a fossil in the Cerrejón coal mine in Colombia. What do you want to be when you grow up? Would you want to explore the world searching for long lost...
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New App adds Virtual Flesh to Victorian-era Bone exhibit
Point your smartphone at the skeleton of a vampire bat mounted in a museum case, wait a minute and you will see it wiggle, jump down and scuttle away. Of course, the bat’s not actually escaping, but...
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Key Link in Turtle Evolution discovered
Pappochelys could grow up to 8 inches in length, had a long tail and used its tiny, peg-like teeth to feed on small insects and worms in what is now southern Germany. In June 2015, an international...
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Did mystery worms cause world’s first mass extinction?
Earth’s first multicellular creatures had soft bodies. This illustration shows a community of Ediacaran biota, some of which resemble living ocean creatures. Others are unlike any known organisms and...
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Fossils help scientists build a picture of the past—and present
A word to the wise: don’t ask a paleontologist to pick a favorite fossil. It’s like asking your mother which child she loves most, or asking a baseball slugger to choose his favorite bat. With over 40...
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New Montana ant species emerge from 46-million-year-old rock
“Crematogaster aurora,” queen. This specimen is the oldest known species in its genus. She was a stunning brown queen; drowned some 46 million years ago in a shallow lake in Montana. Her remains,...
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New horse-sized tyrannosaur with big brain reveals how “T. rex” became top...
Life reconstruction of the new tyrannosaur “Timurlengia euotica” in its environment 90 millionyears ago. It is accompanied by two flying reptiles, “Azhdarcho longicollis”. (Original painting by Todd...
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Ancient whales
This illustration by Carl Buell depicts Ocucajea picklingi (center) and Supayacetus muizoni (bottom), two ancient whales that lived off the Peruvian coast during the Eocene, between 56-34 million years...
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Details of ancient shark attack preserved in fossil whale bone
A fragment of whale rib found in a North Carolina strip mine is offering scientists a rare glimpse at the interactions between prehistoric sharks and whales some 3- to 4-million years ago during the...
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Wayne Clough & Carlos Jaramillo, at a research site near the Panama Canal.
Smithsonian Secretary Wayne Clough, left, talks with Carlos Jaramillo, scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, at a research site near the Panama Canal. Jaramillo and his...
View ArticleConrad Labandiera, Smithsonian palentologist, studies fossils to learn how...
The post Conrad Labandiera, Smithsonian palentologist, studies fossils to learn how insects got along before flowering plants arrived appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.
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Insect mimic of ginko-like leaf discovered 165 million years after its...
A new species of hangingfly with wings that perfectly mimic the multi-lobed leaf of an ancient ginkgo-like tree has been discovered in China by scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of...
View ArticleHow do paleontologists reconstruct environments from the ancient past?
The post How do paleontologists reconstruct environments from the ancient past? appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.
View ArticleReplicating whale fossils found in Chile
The post Replicating whale fossils found in Chile appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.
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Scientists find impact of open-ocean industrial fishing within centuries of...
The impact of industrial fishing on coastal ecosystems has been studied for many years. But how it affects food webs in the open ocean―a vast region that covers almost half of the Earth’s surface―has...
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Exhibition: “Whales: From Bone to Book”
The Smithsonian Libraries will open its new exhibition “Whales: From Bone to Book” in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History on May 25. This exhibition is a...
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