SPINOSAURUS 2020 - It Just Got Weirder

hey paleo ours put down your pens and stop drawing Spinosaurus trust me on this [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] it seems the last handful of months have been some of the most spectacular and unexpected in the realm of paleontology first there were the images of a carnotaur skull surfacing online which appeared to a preserved soft tissue that turned out to be hematite concretions then there was the resurfacing of a very old image of the outer casing of a Protoceratops fossil from Mongolia that also turned out not to be nearly as spectacular as many in the online paleo community originally interpreted a new bombshell has been dropped and dropped on an even more beloved dinosaur genus Spinosaurus very much like Tyrannosaurus when Spinosaurus was first discovered it didn't immediately become a cultural icon though Tyrannosaurus ultimately took that title and with haste the inherit of Spinosaurus remains would skulk around the analysis of paleontology despite being completely obliterated time and time again with its inclusion in the third Jurassic Park film Spinosaurus was forcibly catapulted into the public's consciousness of the handful of dinosaurs which make up the masses menagerie of real monsters you know how I'll say the line only new material will lighten us further on the anatomy of this ancient creature that isn't just a thing I'd say to end a video it's a reality we all must face as scientists studying the crumbled remains of the Earth's ancient past as bleak as the chances of any individual animal fossilized is any one species or genus tends to exist without changing or mutation for a biologically significant span of time in the ballpark of tens of thousands to a couple million years depending on who you ask therefore even with what comparatively little fossil evidence we do have and that does exist out there more material have already known taxa does surface time and time again and Spinosaurus is no different world war two I'm sure you've heard the story before but it bears repeating beyond the usual parroted factoid the spinal bones were bombed the first remains of Spinosaurus were uncovered in the western desert of north-central Egypt these remains are part of a collection of fossils uncovered in the Baha Raya Oasis during the 1910s and 1920s under the auspice of paleontologist Ernst Stromer of Germany Stromer found the first remains he called Spinosaurus in the 1910s he then found more material which he considered distinct from the first and simply designated it Spinosaurus B it would remain a phantom taxon over the next century variously referred to other animals like carcharodontosaurus and the even more enigmatic spinosaur sigil massive source despite this these second remains would come up again down the road Stromer was an incredible scientist and expedition er especially during the early 1900's and led many excursions to Egypt uncovering vast riches of the Cretaceous most of the animals making up the ecosystem of this area were found by Stromer including Egypt asaurus carcharodontosaurus stomata suka s-- Pahari asaurus and of course Spinosaurus in my opinion he deserves a biopic in line with Mary Anning and many other scientists I mean if the story of an anti-nazi scientist furbish Lee attempting to solve the giant carnivore puzzle of Cretaceous Egypt only to have his life's work destroyed by an Allied bombing raid during World War two after pleading with the actual Nazi director of the Munich museum to move all the precious artifacts away from the encroaching war doesn't deserve big screen blockbuster type biopic I don't know it does it's war dinosaurs science and everything you'd want from a movie how has this not been made Spielberg get on it scratch that blob Camp Edwards or Villeneuve get on it fellows Moroccan monsters with the bones of Spinosaurus gone there was nothing to be done in uncovering the mystery until new fossils could be found from here on all future Spinosaurus fossils were uncovered outside of Egypt namely Morocco was some reported from Algeria and yeah those partial remains uncovered in 90s only consisted of bones which had been previously destroyed the ends of the jaws claws teeth a dorsal vertebra here and a cervical vertebra there nothing which would unequivocally outline the mysterious shape of the spine giants form Ernst Stromer had reconstructed a speculative skeleton of the animal based on the fossils he had at hand and other known giant theropods at the time overall it was basically a giant Alice or or Tyrannosaur which walked upright on its hind legs dragging its lumbering tail to and fro it had the characteristically crocodile like lower jaw uncomfortably grafted unto an Alice or like skull and the famous vertebral spine sticking out of its back those Stromer was correct in his inclinations of APIs givers water adjacent lifestyle he did not reconstruct the rest of its body to reflect this the advent of the dinosaur Renaissance forced paleontologists at the time to fit those fragments of the spine reptile into a shape that made sense since more spinous swords were uncovered during the 90s and following decades an idea of the group as a whole and all of the characteristics they shared was far more solid Baryonyx from early cretaceous england gave the first nearly complete body form of a spinous sword since the discovery of Spinosaurus itself the dinosaur supervisors and consultants for Jurassic Park 3 used the knowledge lent by Baryonyx and the Spinosaurus fragments at the time to reconstruct the massively forearmed bipedal hyper carnivore you see on screen this image of the creature would not stand at the test of time the year before Jurassic resurrection thousands of artisanal miners have scoured the southeastern region of Morocco for years to find fossils to sell though this practice works in an ethical and legal gray area the industry is vital to the survival of many in the region and in my opinion should not be outright condemned dr. nazar Ibrahim assistant professor of biology at the University of Detroit Mercy has made it his top priority to get to know local diggers their hulls for elusive remains of the giant sail back the bombshell story of the discovery of a cache of Spinosaurus fossils from this region via the web of indigenous fossil diggers made headlines in Nature National Geographic and many others in 2014 dr. Ibrahim recovered many pieces of arms legs ribs and the skull the animal was reconstructed as a quadrupedal knuckle-walking short leg to w sailed long tailed creature which spent most if not all of its time in the water a super specialized swimmer Spinosaurus was and is the first unequivocal example of an aquatic dinosaur this reconstruction was not without its critics plenty found fault with the assumption of knuckle walking as it has never been observed in any other dinosaur ever the anatomy of the four limbs and mass estimates for Spinosaurus strictly forbid this method of locomotion on a physical and biological level the four-legged morphology of the animal was perceived due to the extremely short back legs and large four limbs it seemed as though it would have been too top-heavy to walk on two legs many also found the specimens guilty of being a chimera or worse a hoax paleontologist dr. Andreea kaw has tried to be an unbiased supporter of the 2014 interpretation what follows is a shortened reworded and rephrased version of what he wrote on his theropod a blog one of the most stubborn objections to Spinosaurus semi-aquatic re-evaluation focuses on the specimens artificiality that is on the idea that it's too strange to be natural supporters of this position are not convinced the 2014 specimen is genuine rather they believe it's an unnatural assembly a chimera at best this chimera would be the result of an oversight of the author's unconsciously and naively assembled by combining elements of distinct animals at worse it is a fake built voluntarily from parts of skeletons from distant areas to create a sensational animal on which to make money I have and continue to consider the specimen a genuine fossil since its publication as there are no serious reasons to doubt this there is no positive evidence of presence of more than one individual at the site since histological bone analyses don't show differences between the various parts there is no evidence the fossil is a chimera and the mere fact it's bizarre doesn't represent proof it's fake spinal typo spinal tadpole this brings me to the news of the year in all past specimens of Spinosaurus the tail is absent all previous reconstructions either skeletally or in life assumed it had a tail roughly similar in overall shape to other large bodied theropod dinosaurs dr. Ibrahim and his team went back to the Moroccan Spinosaurus site in 2018 to scour the area for more remains and more remains that did find time was of the essence he had heard from local contacts that commercial fossil diggers were tunneling into nearby hills for bones Ibrahim could not risk letting the rest of what he believed to be the world's only known Spinosaurus skeleton vanished into collectors curio cabinets all the new remains are products of rigorous documented excavations carried out by a team of geologists and paleontologists and therefore cannot be accused of a course composition of scattered bones collected without criterion by amateur collectors some critics raised doubts about the authenticity of the original fossil since those remains reached paleontologists indirectly and were excavated by a local finder with the new excavations criticisms of 2014 are therefore definitively debunked as just hokum the grueling excavation was worth the trouble as dr. Ibrahim and his team found tail vertebra after tail vertebra by the end of the dig season 30 tail vertebrae and pieces of the feet were collected and archived in a lab in Casablanca what really sealed the deal for the comparisons made between the vertebrae they found and the vertebrae Stromer found in the 1910s his illustrations of the very few and fragmentary tail vertebrae matched up to those found at this new site this new tale of Spinosaurus proves definitively the creature was aquatic Spinosaurus is now slightly less of a mystery just the facts jack many vertebrates have bones on the top bottom and sides of the vertebrae these spines do different jobs the ones on top called the neural arches act as protection and organization of the spinal cord and spinal nerves as they run through the animal the spiny bit above that is the neural spine the spine as well as the spines on the sides and underside are places for muscles to attach the size of the spines and their width apart from one another correspond to the size and amount of muscles which attach to them the new tail fossils of Spinosaurus outfit the creature with a new light Hale flattened sideways and expanded up and down it should be no surprise these vertebrae are extremely weird the special science word for bones which stick out of the sides of the vertebra is transverse process the new fossils show that these spines were very wide at the base of the tail they stuck out to the side at a near 90 degree angle these sideways spines combined with the tall neural spine and the Chevron bones of the underside make for what would have been a robustly muscled base to the tail they remained this thick until about that eleventh or twelfth vertebra at which point the sideways transverse processes shrink until they disappear altogether by the 18th vertebra after this point in the tale the neural spines are no longer broad from the side they become pencil-thin with a weird bulbous point at the end and start to curve forward and down the shrinking and disappearing of the transverse processes means the muscle blocks of the tail also shrink from the base of the tail to the tip the middle of the tail is oval-shaped and the end is pill-shaped in cross-section this also means the tail has a strong base in a weaker length in order to prove the tails effectiveness and propelling the beast through its home dr. Ibrahim and his team conducted a series of simple experiments they cut a tale of Spinosaurus Allosaurus Coelophysis a Nile crocodile a crested newt and a regular ass rectangle out of pliable plastic then attached each one to a special machine this device combined a water flume with sensors cameras and Pistons to track movements of aquatic animals and the forces they impart as they move the team found the Spinosaurus tail to deliver eight times the forward thrust recorded from the aloe source and Coelophysis tails it was not as efficient Norris powerful as the crocodile and Newt tails placing it in between all four variables already there's been a pleasant back-and-forth in the paleo community questioning whether this really proves what the authors say it proves according to the authors of the new paper this experiment proves Spinosaurus uses its tail as an active propeller giving it enough force to go after prey in the water if this is valid this would mean Spinosaurus was mostly if not entirely aquatic in habit every time Spinosaurus enter the discussion crocodiles are brought up in comparison it's easy to see why they both have long conical teeth live in or near water have long tails and skulls pockmarked with sensor holes regrettably for this charming anecdotal comparison these two groups are very different more contemporaneously crocodiles and Spinosaurus are compared due to the hypothesis of similar locomotion when in the water that is swishing the tail from side to side in a relatively flexible manner anatomist paleontologist and skeletal artist Scott Hartmann pointed out how the Spinosaurus vertebrae are not like those of crocodilians it's also worth noting that the transverse processes reduce posteriorly quite quickly not at all like crocodilians he's talking about how the tail is really fat and muscly at the base and then thins out very quickly leaving most of its length of the paddle like shape dr. Marc Whitten tweeted with in addition to being delicate those reclined and neural spines overhang three or so verts - which would limit flexion my understanding is that croc tails are quite different powerful and flexible - the tails end so less like a crocodiles powerful fluke and more like a gondola lazily pushing itself along a river unlike Spinosaurus crocodile tails have transverse processes which continue along the entire tail length these sideways blades of bone provide an ample and this for the attachment of large muscle blocks to aid in the power behind each sideways undulation of the tail this means crocodile tails are powered along the entire length while a spinosaurus tail has the most force at its base a new problem with the tail now becomes obvious critics have lauded the spines are too fragile thin and immobile to produce sufficient thrust for the animal to use it as the main propulsion mechanism for active predation as dr. Whitten previously stated the thin spines bend backwards and slightly down which means by the time you reach their tip they overhang the vertebrae directly after it for a tail to be super flexible it cannot have any bone in the way which is the case of the crocodiles tail all the spines point up without any risking the possibility of bumping into one another which provides the tail extreme flexibility this extreme flexibility is what you need in order to remain stable in the water when swishing your tail it may seem counterintuitive we use a stiff flat paddle to move our boats by hand for an animal this is very different when we use a stiff paddle it pushes our boats sure but when have you ever seen a rowboat move as fast as a cruising crocodile the currents under the surface are stronger and require an animal to adapt a swishy tail to counter the curds which could force its body to become unstable and roll all over the place a stiff paddle under the water works but it doesn't work well and would force Spinosaurus to move very slowly if it used its tail as the primary tool for propulsion dinosaur specialist dr. Dave hone has suggested Spinosaurus wouldn't have been a persuit predator even with the current tail reconstruction he goes on to state my point would be there's a lot of things it could be doing but one of those has been picked without any specific support or any real discussion of alternate possibilities yes the tail shows some adaptations for swimming but nothing that says hyper specialist to me and even if it did that would fit with the hypothesized regular movement between patchy resources as well if not better than pursued predator crocodiles aren't exactly pursuit predators they usually tend to wait and ambush large mammals at the water's edge they will often undergo pursuit though especially underwater the results of the Ibraheim water flume experiment showed the crocodiles tail to be more efficient and powerful than Spinosaurus so as little pursuit as crocodilians do Spinosaurus likely did even less some artists like Gabriel you gueto have suggested this tale may have been more useful in display similar to the modern sailfin lizards or basilisks both of these lizards are great swimmers but don't utilize their tail fins in an active locomotory function when in water they use their tails to help them get away from predators and to swim once they break the water surface tension they also don't have the sideways bones on their tail vertebrae like the crocodilians in a very similar fashion to Spinosaurus unlike Spinosaurus these lizards only have the tall neural spines near the base and it becomes a regular lizard tail for the rest of its length for these reasons and the difference in size phylogenetics and body form I don't think they are great comparisons ignoring the Elva or the fish in the room fellow paleontology student Tyler Greenfield raised an interesting point the whole point about the spines being too thin is moot when you look at fish in suit msu paleo student Richard Carr posted George Lauder one of the co-authors on this new paper has basically written the book on lateral undulatory aquatic vertebrae locomotion and biomechanics if he says the tail could propel this animal then by god that's what evolution intended now though I completely disagree with his reasoning in that last bit his point stands that expertise in undulatory biomechanics of one of the authors does lend some form of credibility to claims of the tail as main locomotion mechanism despite the fragility and overlap of the thin spines if we take active swimming pelagic examples of ray-finned fish like sailfin x' we can plainly see they have a variety of different arrangements of vertebrae in there some of which have spines overlapping three or more vertebrae yet they use their tails as their primary propulsion and their pectoral fins as rudders might Spinosaurus been similar we don't know yet the structure of fish fins more closely resembles the tail fin of Spinosaurus then do many other animals but like I went over with the basilisks they're not great comparisons for a bunch of other factors this is a fresh story and new things will come to light as more research experimentation and descriptions are done it was noted Abraham and his team planned to study how Webb do the feet may have been including how wide the toes could spread and whether they could have helped Spinosaurus in moving around in the water the 2014 Spinosaurus site promises to reveal more fossils and future expeditions are not out of the question the full picture of what Spinosaurus truly was continues to unravel and I cannot wait to be there when it does [Music]

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Keywords: #paleontology, #cryptozoology, #science, #education, #facebook, #twitter, #Youtube, #fossils, #dinosaurs, #EDGE, #Zoology, #naturalhistory, #scicomm, #geology, #jurassic world, #jurassic park, #jurassic world evolution, #jurassic world fallen kingdom, #jurassic world dominion, #spinosaurus, #monsterhunter, #nizar ibrahim, #godzilla, #waterflume

Id: De1VJ1UpjhM

Length: 22min 5sec (1325 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 30 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/Homo_Stultum]

And a regular ass rectangle