The Most Important Discoveries in Paleontology - Part 2

the 20th century was a time of great change from great wars social reforms and technological advances and while all of this was going on the field of paleontology continued to have its own of revelations many of which are today immense to our understanding of past worlds and the inhabitants that lived in them from dinosaurs to our closest relatives here are some of the most important discoveries in a paleontology part two designated as a ranch known as rancho la brea of over 4 400 hectares it was given to antonio jose rocha in 1828 with the proviso that the residents of the pueblo could have access to as much asphalt as they needed for personal use given at the large amounts of tar present in the area but what they did not know is that within this vast resource of natural asphalt was a treasure trove of animals that were remarkably preserved within the tar pits when tar-covered bones were first found on the rancho la brea property in what is now los angeles they were for years not thought to belong to long-since extinct animals as the ranch had lost many animals over the years including horses cattle dogs and even camels whose bones closely resembled the ones found in the tar pits it wasn't until 1875 when professor william denton english geologist and spiritualist visited the rancho with the then owner henry hancock presenting to him what turned out to be the canine tooth of an extinct sabretooth cat denton also collected the bones and teeth of an extinct horse and several other extinct animals and was likely the first person to recognize that the bones belonged to many extinct animals although he was the first to realize this as well as him producing a short article on his findings in the proceedings of the boston society of natural history they were largely ignored by the scientific community it was not until 1901 that the bones were again recognized as belonging to extinct animals when its potential as an oil producing site was recognized when petroleum geologist william orcus alongside fellow scientist fm anderson collected intermittently for about four years until they discovered a fossiliferous deposit that contained even more bones than asphaltic matrix excited by this find anderson contacted john and miriam at the university of california in 1905 and the significance of the fossil bones found at the ranch was finally recognized by the scientific community the largest and best documented collections at the time were made by the los angeles museum between 1913 and 1915 with over 96 sites being excavated yielding over 750 000 specimens of plants and animals as los angeles grew the rancho was eventually subdivided and developed with its last owner george hancock son of henry hancock recognized the scientific importance of the site and created hancock park in 1924 when he donated 23 acres of the ranch to the county of los angeles on the condition that the park be preserved and the fossils found to be properly exhibited during the time that's the la brea tar pits have been explored and excavated the bones of millions of organisms comprising of more than 600 species have been recovered both extinct and extend comprising of noticeable animals like smilodon direwolves ground sloths and mammoths with a notable disparity between the number of predators and prey with only four centimeters of tar being enough to ensnare even the largest of animals predators would have been attracted to the tar pits by the struggles of unfortunate animals that would have wandered unassumingly into the traps for water but were unable to see the danger due to dust and leaves which would have concealed the liquid asphalt and while not a common situation here before entrapment has been estimated to have occurred once every 50 years the availability of easy prey would have been irresistible to many of america's scavengers and predators as a predator trap there have therefore been far more remains of predatory animals discovered around 90 percent of all animals found this includes the remains of over 200 000 dire wolves the most common animals recovered from the pits alongside 66 000 smilodon fatalis specimens given that so many individuals have been found of these animals it allows for a great amount of insight into individual variation and anatomy of the animals from a range of different ages leading to a more complete view of these remarkable animals but it isn't just the remains of the largest and most notable animals that have made the tarpits so fascinating as the smaller and less outright impressive organisms are just as important to gain a better picture of the area surrounding the tarpit the insects plants and pollen grains are also highly valued as they are key indicators for what the climate of los angeles would have been during the pleistocene around 50 to 10 000 years ago due to the nature of the tar pits and the asphalt that it contains the bones of even the smallest and most delicate of organisms are remarkably preserved which is incredibly unique as it's one of the few paleontological sites in the world where an entire ecosystem can be represented as smaller animals like insects can have a much more narrow range than larger animals and therefore would be found close to the area where they were recovered from nests of wood rats have also been found which have beautifully preserved the twigs leaves and seeds that they were made of as well as fecal pellets these key remains suggest that the climate of southern california has been relatively stable over the past 50 000 years and this gives us the opportunity to compare and contrast how our world has and will change in the future and even after a century of excavation and field work new remains are still consistently being found and the legacy of the tar pits and what could still be found is essential to our understanding of what the world was like back in the pleistocene as one of the largest theropods tyrannosaurus rex is surely one of the most notorious of all dinosaurs with their impressive mass and bone-crushing bites and their discovery is most definitely one of the most notable in a paleontology and mainly due to the media that surrounded their discovery and publication while the remains of tyrannosaurus have likely been uncovered for centuries without the knowledge of what they belong to the first remains of what we would associate with tyrannosaurus being two vertebral fragments were described by paleontologist edward's drinker cope a key player of the bone wars in 1892 who believed that the two vertebral fragments belonged to a ceratopside dinosaur naming them monospondylus gigas meaning giant porous vertebra in reference to the numerous openings for blood vessels here found in the bones the bones were in 1907 however identified by paleontologist john hatcher as those of a theropod rather than a ceratopsid although for over 100 years these remains were all but forgotten as copenhage continued their bits of rivalry to search for more bones although as we'll get into this wasn't the end for mano spondulous after the end of the bone wars fossil hunters continued the search for dinosaur bones with museums seeking out for even more impressive bones to display and study sponsored by the american museum of natural history paleontologists barnum brown and charles sternberg set out on expeditions with barnum in particular looking for a trophy triceratops skull that would be a great addition to their ever-expanding collections while on the search for the remains he encountered the fossils of a large carnivorous dinosaur that was around 13 percent complete instead of shipping the intriguing fossil back to new york however barnum continued to press on with his search for a triceratops skull later on in 1902 brown on another expedition was led to some bones eroding out of the earth by a local landowner in montana in what is now known as the hill creek formation these bones turned out to be something not yet seen before taking him and several workers three years to excavate the remains comprising of 10 of the total skeleton when the remains were fully excavated in 1905 barnum transported both specimens to henry fairfield osborne who described both of the specimens the specimen uncovered in 1900 was named dynamosaurus imperiosis meaning a dynamic imperial reptile and was thought to have been covered in armor-like osteodomes due to the remains of another dinosaur likely that's of an ankylosaurus being found next to the skeleton although this would later prove to be inaccurate the 1902 specimen was named tyrannosaurus rex meaning a tyrant lizard king with us born unbeknownst to the fact that the two specimens belonged to one species osborne published his descriptions in a paper called tyrannosaurus and other cretaceous carnivorous dinosaurs that would be published in 1905. after the paper was published osborne realized his mistake in 1906 and as nomenclature rules traditionally go the name of the specimen in the first publication is used however since both specimens were published in the same paper the page numbers of the paper were instead used to determine the correct name of this type of animal the dynamosaurus specimen was described a few pages after the tyrannosaurus specimen and therefore even though dynamosaurus was found first tyrannosaurus became the official name dynamosaurus therefore became a synonym of tyrannosaurus and the name of the latter became one of the most famous titles of any extinct animal and all because of the placement of pages in a scientific paper when it comes to manuspondulus in 2000 peter larson from the black hills institute was able to locate the spot where the original specimen of manuspondulus gigus was discovered and likely managed to excavate more of the original animal around 10 percent of a total skeleton and it was clearly identifiable as belonging to a tyrannosaurus since manospandalis gigas was the actual first tyrannosaurus discovered the name it would normally be deemed invalid and tyrannosaurus would therefore become invalid however the iczn which has the rules to ranking animals did an update in 2000 in that any name that has been sufficiently published enough and been considered valid for 50 years can't be replaced by an older game which was deemed as invalid during that period of time since tyrannosaurus fit these rules the tyrant's lizard king tomb once again continued to survive since it was first described in 1905 tyrannosaurus rex has become one of the most studied and therefore one of the most well understood non-avian dinosaurs and as such has had many theories debates and studies all centred on this one species tyrannosaurus has also become one of the most widely recognized dinosaur species in a popular culture in a part not only due to its formidable appearance but the time and place where it was discovered due to tyrannosaurus being described in 1905 the largest theropod dinosaurs known to science at the time included the genuses of allosaurus and megalosaurus and while large animals were not nearly as bulky and enormous in their stature as tyrannosaurus and due to being the first described of these giant theropods it's meant that every other large theropod from spinosaurus to acrocanthosaurus would therefore be compared to tyrannosaurus the original truly large theropod tyrannosaurus was also discovered in the usa which due to the country being filled with many well-known fossil sites was especially promising to paleontologists helping to inspire many to find dinosaurs in the process the media of the time also favored tyrannosaurus immensely with osborne himself billing them as the greatest hunters to have ever walked the earth and a comment by the new york times hailed tyrannosaurus as the most formidable fighting animal of which there is any record whatsoever the king of all kings in the domain of animal life the absolute warlord of the earth and a royal man-eater of the jungle charles r knight also painted a mural incorporating tyrannosaurus facing a triceratops in the field museum of natural history establishing the two dinosaurs as iconic adversaries that still to this day remains noteworthy inspiring many now renowned paleontologists like phil curry and others to study these magnificent animals the reconstructed holotype of tyrannosaurus standing tall in the carnegie museum in pittsburgh after being moved from the amnh due to the very real threat of a german bombing of new york during world war ii was also key in boosting the popularity of tyrannosaurus as the mount continues to be iconic still being on display in the museum with a now more accurate posture tyrannosaurus was also heavily featured on film starting in 1918 with the ghost of slumber mountain written and directed by stop-motion special effects pioneer willis o'brien as well as featuring in the classic adaptation of arthur conan doyle's the lost world in 1925 as well as in king kong in 1933 one of the most iconic depictions of tyrannosaurus came with jurassic park bringing a more modern view of tyrannosaurus into the public eye and giving a truly iconic display of power and terror which coupled with the intense atmosphere is most definitely one of the reasons why jurassic park is such a renowned film and inspired many to become interested in dinosaurs and the field of paleontology the popularity of the film also factored into the world of dinosaur science as the discovery of the dinosaur genus shipionics which were lying in storage in a basement in italy until the discover of the fines watched jurassic park and he was compelled to take the fossil to a museum for examination through many more films skeletal mounts and documentaries tyrannosaurus became an iconic genus of animal across the world and is known of among people of all ages cultures and nationalities tyrannosaurus rex is also the only dinosaur that is commonly known to the general public by its full scientific or binomial name and the scientific abbreviation of t-rex has also come into wide usage and with a name that is irresistible to the tongue it is no wonder as to why as one of the most researched dinosaurs it means that we know a lot more about them and than compared to other related genera anatomy speed growth rates brain structure and social behavior are just a few of the many topics that have been covered in regards to these animals and with the disparity between the massive body and skull with their comparatively tiny arms constant comparisons to other dinosaurs as well as numerous debates being centered around them it is no wonder as to why tyrannosaurus rex is such an important discovery when it comes to paleontology until the discovery of this remarkable fossil site the knowledge of the oldest forms of life were hazy and ill-defined and the jump from small bacteria to the first complex life was quite dramatic with a great amount of genera clearly not being represented in the fossil record this would all change in 1909 when remains of these long extinct animals were found by paleontologist and geologist charles walcott who at the time was secretary of the smithsonian institution discovering them while exploring at the canadian rockies of british columbia with his initial survey covering an area of 10 feet tall and 200 feet long named after the nearby burgess pass from late august to early september of 1909 walcott his team and even members of his family all collected fossils there and in 1910 walcott opened up a quarry that he and his colleagues revisited in 1911 1912 1913 1917 and 1924 that's now bears his name and managed to recover over 60 000 specimens in total what was incredibly remarkable about the animals they found was such they were all well preserved and until newer sites were discovered in the late 1980s that were of similar quality the burgess shale fossils provided the only evidence and glimpse of the early soft and hard-bodied animals that appeared after the massive radiation of the cambrian explosion the fauna uncovered includes over 180 species some familiar and some that belonged to previously unknown phyla including operinia a five-eyed creature with a grasping proboscis hallucigenia a marina worm that earned its name due to its confusing anatomy and how it should be properly reconstructed originally being reconstructed so that they were upside down as they appeared to ambulate across the shallow sea floors on seven pairs of stilts-like spines and picaya an inch and a half long animal that with a primitive notochord hence being one of the earliest chordates and therefore a potential ancestor or cousin to living vertebrates including us these remarkable finds are only possible due to the remarkable preservation quality that can in some cases form a three-dimensional image of an animal allowing scientists to view in astonishing detail the morphology soft tissue exoskeletons limbs and the infillings of the gut in some rare fossils there is even evidence of gut contents and muscle an example being the internal organs of the especially well-preserved otoya worms one of the more common inhabitants of the shale this wide range of organisms lived in underwater mud banks known as phylopod beds water currents would then on occasion periodically cause sediments to flow in the form of mudslides quickly burying any living organism in the moving sediment fossils have been found in random orientations indicative of a sudden event and there is also evidence that they were killed immediately marine invertebrates are known to normally curl up upon dying and many of the fossils found do not exhibit this coiling there is also no evidence of any attempt by the organisms to burrow out of the mud and being instantly killed and engulfed by the fine sediments the preservation process would have begun immediately typically only the hard parts are preserved in most other cambrian animals limiting the amount of information that can be gathered and represented with the burgess show on the other hand detailing an incredible range of species that would otherwise be very unlikely to fossilize anywhere else the fossils of the burgess shale are also an important early record of the novel body plans that were formed after the cambrian explosion 530 million years ago and were some of the first complex animals to be found in the world since its discovery the burgess shale has become the most well known a picture of life in the cambrian period and no longer relying on the remnants of hard shells or exoskeletons we now have a much better and richer picture of early animal communities revealing that soft-bodied organisms are now known to have existed in greater numbers and variety than the other cambrian organisms that exhibit hard parts with this unique glimpse into the long distant past and being able to view these extinct animals in such an extraordinary and detailed way is reason enough for their importance to the field of paleontology [Music] until the discovery of this remarkable skull the history of us as a species was much more convoluted and undecided as to where our true origins lied the tongue child as it was to be named was first discovered in 1924 being uncovered alongside many other fossils from the tufa formations that were being mined at the time and thankfully many were saved by the miners whenever possible many of these bones belonged to extinct fauna which included baboons and other primates and the more complete and interesting fossils were often kept as curiosities by the europeans who managed operations this was how the find made its way to anatomist and anthropologist raymond dart with his colleague professor robert burns sending him two crates of fossils from tongue in the northwest province of south africa upon seeing the fossils dart immediately recognized a skull which was quite different compared to the rest as the cranial dimensions were far too large for a baboon or chimpanzee dart later wrote i knew at a glance that what lay in my hands was no ordinary anthropoidal brain here in lime consolidated sand was the replica of a brain three times as large of that of a baboon and considerably bigger than that of an adult chimpanzee named the tongue child due to the first molars having just begun to erupt through the gum and become visible as teeth dart completed a paper only 40 days after he first saw the fossil naming the new species australopithecus africanus the southern ape from africa and described it as an extinct race of apes intermediates between living anthropoids and man darts noted that the teeth of the child were more like a human child than an ape and noted that the position of the forum in a magnum the hole through which the spinal cord connects with the brain was positioned towards the front of the tongue child's skull a characteristic associated with bipedal locomotion after his paper was published it immediately came under heavy fire with many critics at the time europe and asia was thought to be the crucial hub for human evolution and many scientists did not accept that africa was an important site due to the lack of evidence with prominent anatomists like sir arthur keith dart's former mentor describing the specimen as just an ape and of no major importance there were many reasons as to why it took decades for the field to accept dart's claim first and foremost being that the british scientific establishment has been fooled by the hoax of piltdown man which having a large brain and ape-like teeth fits more in line with the thought that early hominins evolved a large brain very early on in their history and with the tongue child's small brain and human-like teeth it was therefore deemed as an unlikely ancestor another reason is that despite accepting that modern humans had emerged through evolution many anthropologists believed that the genus homo had split from the great apes as long as 30 million years ago and felt uneasy about accepting that humans had a relatively small-brained ape-like ancestor only 2 million years ago half a century earlier though darwin himself had toyed with the prospect of human emergence occurring in africa stating that two of our closest relatives chimpanzees and gorillas both call the continent home that being said darwin didn't oppose the idea that humans originated in europe with findings like neanderthals and the hoax that was pilked down man it wasn't hard to see why for many years dismissed by experts the true significance of the fines did not gain momentum for decades with scientists insisting that it wasn't worth contemplating until an adult specimen had been found there was however one man whose interest was piqued by this and that was robert broome a scottish doctor and paleontologist who became a vocal advocate of dart's claims bruma made it his mission to find an adult australopithecus fossil and ventured to the stir fontaine caves near johannesburg in search of these remains where he instead unearthed and described the remains of dinopithecus a huge baboon in his second visit to the caves in 1936 broom's dream became true when he discovered the first adult australopithecus called tm151 and numerous other specimens were subsequently excavated including a new species broomer named paranthropus robustus and the almost complete skull of mrs please which later turned out to belong to the same species as the tongue child with evidence mounting it became increasingly difficult to dismiss australopithecus as one of our earliest ancestors and the idea that we emerged in africa was finally accepted by the scientific community in regards to the tongue child close analysis of the dental development crown formation and root length estimated that the child would have been around three years of age at the time of their death and when compared to the skull of a nine-year-old modern human it suggested that a africanus had a growth rate more similar to that of modern apes like chimpanzees than to that of modern homo sapiens with an estimated height of 105 centimeters tall and weighing around 9 to 11 kilograms the town child is also thought to have been attacked and killed by an eagle as puncture marks were found at the bottom of the three-year-old's eye sockets resembling those made by modern eagles sharp talons and beak when they attack monkeys in africa today other evidence for the eagle kill hypothesis includes the presence of eggshells at the site and an unusual mixture of bones from small animals including high racks rodents tortoise and small antelope which is uncommon compared with animal bones at other early human sites today the tongue child is regarded as one of the most significant hominin finds of the 20th century and was key in placing africa as the true origin of humanity the scientific community took 20 more years to widely accept australopithecus as a member of the human family tree but in doing so was finally able to put the first pieces together on where we first originated and expanding the field of paleoanthropology in a massive way sluggish cold-blooded and gigantic all of these tombs for the most part personified the view of dinosaurs by many people before the discovery of the remarkable animals that will be discussed and while there were some critics of these ideas they were either disregarded or not well known the story of how all of this changed started in 1931 when the first remains were uncovered from southern montana near the town of billings in what is now known as the cloverley formation by a team of paleontologists led by barnum brown who was primarily concerned with excavating and preparing the remains of the dinosaur to nuntasaurus now tinantosaurus when he reported the discovery of a small carnivorous dinosaur close to the skeleton the bones were however encased in a thick matrix that proved it difficult to prepare and never managed to finish the preparations to describe it and having the skeleton put on display he gave it the informal name of daptosaurus agilis and it wasn't until little more than 30 years later in the august of 1964 that's paleontologist john ostrom led an expedition from yale's peabody museum which discovered more skeletal material near bridger montana expeditions during the following two summers uncovered more than one thousand bones among which were at least three individual animals though a myriad of bones were available many important bones were either missing or hard to interpret there were a few post-orbital skull elements no femurs sacrums verticulars or sternums but what was there was enough ostrom to assign these remains to a new taxon ostrom published his findings in february 1969 giving all refuge remains the new name of dinonicus anteropus the genus name meaning terrible claw and the species name meaning counterbalancing due to the animal's stiffened tail replacing the previous tomb of daptosaurus due to its being informal and never officially published ostrom noted in his description that the remains of deinonychus were quite like those of other dinosaurs discovered up until this point he noted that there were long strings of muscle running along the tail making it a stiff counterbalance that would have allowed for more effective balance when running and jumping ostrom also noted some other characteristics that indicated that dinonicus were fleet of foot and highly predatious as the forums were long as were the hands possessing long and slender digits that beared large raptorial recurved claws and the neural spines of the dorsal vertebrae bear very prominent anterior and posterior scars that match the scars present on the thoracic vertebral spines of rattites like the extinct moa ostrich or emu which in these animals the bony scars are the sites of attachment for robust interspinous ligaments this allows these animals to maintain the dorsal vertebral series in a nearly horizontal position with the striking similarities between them being strong evidence that dinonicus and other dinosaurs may have maintained a horizontal posture over the traditional vertical posture then had been depicted up until this point he noted that the upright posture allowed the muscles to better retain and generate heat and given the remarkable anatomy ostrom postulated that dinonicus highly predatious agile and active animals far from the plotting it cold-blooded dinosaurs that were still mainstream up until this point an interpretation that at the time proved controversial but would later surge in popularity the description of dinonicus reignited debate on dinosaurs which for years was stagnant after the second world war and that dinosaurs were not the evolutionary dead ends that's vanished due to their own pistol design upending common assumptions in the process the dinosaur renaissance as named by ostrom student robert t becker had begun becker himself who would become a notable paleontologist in his own right was the most vocal proponent of the idea that dinosaurs were more active animals and dominant forms of life and where john was cautious on his approach robert was evangelical each revolutionizing the perception of dinosaurs backer was initially dismissed as a young turk whose views could be brushed off by more established paleontologists who didn't quite grasp his ideas but ostrom on the other hand could not be ignored late in 1969 ostrom took his ideas directly to the north american paleontological convention in chicago declaring in a speech that there was impressive if not compelling evidence that many kinds of ancient reptiles were characterized by mammalian or avian levels of metabolism traditionalists in the audience according to bacca as he later recalled shrieked in horror at the suggestion but more pressure would continue to mount that would confirm dinonicus and other dinosaurs as more active animals later on in 1970 as well as the reinvention of dinosaurs as more active the link between dinosaurs and birds which has been initially thought of back in the 1800s was also brought to the forefront when ostrom visited the taylor's museum in the netherlands he was inspecting a dinner plate sized slab of limestone that contained limb fragments vertebrae and ribs that came from the songhofen beds in germany which was found by paleontologist human von mayer who would later become famous for the first scientific description in 1861 of archaeopteryx the fossil austrian was looking over was described by von meyer in 1857 who designated the mane and counter slabs of the fossils tm-6928 and 29 which he identified at the time as a pterosaur dubbing the find pterodactylus crusips this conclusion however didn't make sense to ostrom as he puzzled over the ankles toes and arm bones of the fossil and it wasn't at all like any pterosaur he had ever seen before after his work on dinonicus a few years before ostrom picked up on the different and seemingly more dinosaur-like anatomy and after carrying one of the slabs over to a window and holding it up at an angle in the lights the late afternoon sun caught on some faint ridges which showed unmistakably the clear impression of feathers after having languished in the museum for over 100 years the importance of the finds became obvious to ostrom who at the time realized the remains as belonging to archaeopteryx not only were there now four known specimens of archaeopteryx at the time the apparent similarities to dinonicus set about the idea that birds and dinosaurs were indeed related in some way noticing that the wrist and shoulder bones were nearly identical to that of the previously discovered animal this discovery shifted ostrom's curiosity and attention to the question of the evolutionary history of birds which would in turn rekindle old theories and bring about a completely new understanding of the evolutionary processes that birds and dinosaurs went through to rise a proper technical description however ostrom needed to take the specimen home to the peabody museum at yale for closer study but a series of debates ensued within his mind whether he should return the specimen and affirm to the curator that the fossil was merely a pterosaur only to make the discovery back home or to come out with the truth and risk the museum locking up the suddenly precious slabs ostrom eventually confessed his belief that the fossil belonged to that's of an archaeopteryx which was immediately taken back by the curator who then hurried out of the room ostrom despaired but a few minutes later the curator returned with a shoebox tied up with string handing it to ostrom with the specimen inside he declared that you have made this museum famous which was the beginning of something far bigger than they could have imagined these similarities were in fact recognized back in the 19th century by british biologist and evolution defender thomas huxley who was also known as darwin's bulldog who would also notice similarities between cops ignathus and archaeopteryx deeming that dinosaurs represented an intermediate stage between reptiles and birds with him stating that if found in the fossil states i know not by what test could be distinguished from the bones of a dinosaurian however this momentum was unfortunately cut short in 1926 when gerhard hillman wrote his influential book the origins of birds in which he dismissed the dinosaur bird link based on the dinosaur's supposed lack of a fricular therefore the accepted hypothesis was that birds evolved from crocodylomorph or don't ancestors rather than from dinosaurs which removed dinosaurs from a central role in debates about the origin of living species leading to the decline of academic interest in dinosaurs and the revolution due to them seeming to have no living descendants the discovery of dinonicus changed all of this and reinvigorated to the debate as the similarities to birds appeared unmistakable ostrom continued to push his ideas over the next half dozen years drawing out the similarities between dinonicus and archaeopteryx specimens including the taylor's fossil he published a series of landmark papers including the ancestry of birds the origin of birds and archaeopteryx and the origin of flight the idea that birds have evolved from dinosaurs was not entirely new but ostrom did manage to offer new insights and research into the discussion while here man's books seem to have killed off the dinosaur connection forever due to the seemingly apparent lack of a furcula ostrom noted that this was negative evidence and thus inconclusive as a lot of biological features are missing from the fossil record and it didn't make them any less real collar bones in particular are delicate and therefore unlikely to survive in any recognizable form and in any case several dinosaurs with clavicles had turned up before heal man published his book although they were misidentified and therefore ignored against this false negative ostrom laid out his positive evidence listing a more than 20 anatomical similarities between archaeopteryx and various dinosaurs austrian was very thorough and meticulous and was incredibly hard to refute as he quietly continued his work the dinosaur renaissance largely headed by his student robert becker reinvigorated the worldwide perception of dinosaurs that's with countless books artwork and television appearances made dinosaurs suddenly much more dynamic and interesting than they were before the biggest impact came with the novel and film jurassic park in which the frightfully intelligent velociraptors quickly became one of the most iconic depictions of prehistoric animals even if they are today inaccurate the velociraptors were actually based on deinonychus with crichton using the controversial taxonomy proposed by gregory s paul even though they are mentioned in the novel at another point as velociraptor mongoliensis crichton actually met with ostrom several times at yale university to discuss details of the animal's possible range of behaviors and appearance and at one point apologetically told ostrom that he had decided to use the name velociraptor in a place of dinonicus because the former name was more dramatic according to ostrom crichton stated that the velociraptor of the novel was based on dinonicus in almost every detail and that only the name had been changed hence why the animals in the film are different in terms of their size proportions and skull shape as we all know jurassic park was a success and inspired a whole new generation to be captivated by dinosaurs now associating them with intelligence speed power and immense intrigue nowadays it is widely accepted that birds evolved from and are indeed living theropod dinosaurs and is so commonplace now that the debate has largely turned as to how they were the only branch of dinosaurs to survive the kpg mass extinction which in recent years has become more clear than ever the discovery of dinonicus changed how dinosaurs are depicted both by professional paleoartists and the public eye and by persevering in the face of difficult questions austria managed to upend multiple assumptions in paleontology sparking a more modern and active view of dinosaurs in a media like in jurassic park hence why dinonicus is often described as the most important single discovery of dinosaur paleontology of the 20th century or even of all time the discovery completely reshapes and reinvigorated our understanding of dinosaurs and their lives and through the media millions more have become acquainted to these more active and interesting animals and it was all down to jon ostrom and his writings new methods such as cladistics and the discovery of feathered dinosaurs that's we're guessing too soon confirmed the relationship between dinosaurs and birds and even though ostrom gave up field work in the 1970s due to a physical ailment he had always believed that the best discoveries are made in museum storerooms and that his own correct identification of tm-6928 and 29 had been a classic example of why a paleontologist should not throw away things that can't be absolutely classified as worthless on an unrelated note the description of the relationship between the birds and dinosaurs may not have come about when it did has its been for this possible circumstance when austrian was heading back to his hotel with the taylor specimen of that day in 1970 ostrom had to stop as a public restroom and once leaving realised to his horror that he was empty-handed having left the shoebox containing not just the fossil but the course of paleontology for decades to come on a wash basin in a public restroom ostrom frantically retraced his steps and thankfully found the shoebox untouched snatching its back and clutching us all the way back to his hotel saving the future of modern paleontology as we know it the harlem specimen was later found not to be of an archaeopteryx but of a similar animal later reclassified as australia which as the name suggests was named in honor of ostrom for his immense contributions to the field and ensuring his legacy is continued to be known and revered while finding the bones of extinct animals is important to determining what was around in the distant past the story these bones can tell us is now something highly sought after as glimpses into behavior ecology and interactions with other organisms is important in gauging what these forms of life were like an example of this comes with the dinosaur genus myosaurus dinosaurs that gave us some of the first signs of dinosaur behavior and that they were far more adept and intricate animals than we would have ever thought at the time the first fossils of myosaurus were discovered in 1978 from the two medicine formation in western montana by the owner of a local rock shop mariana brandfold who showed the tiny bones she had collected to paleontologist bill clemens who alerted fellow paleontologists jack horner and robert mackala of the find when they arrived the small bones were identified as the bones of a baby dinosaur a notable find giving the incredible rarity of the fragile remains brandfold directed the two to the location where she found the remains with an excavation going underway to see what else was in the area after a progressive dig centimeter by centimeter the partial skeletons of 15 small dinosaurs were found and with their small size and how close they were when they were preserved they came to the conclusion that this was a dinosaur nest with the first scientifically documented dinosaur eggs of the western hemisphere to be found before this juvenile dinosaurs were noticeably very rare in the fossil record and historically small juveniles like these were typically believed to simply be the remains of adults of a new small species but the remains of these new dinosaurs were evidently those of juvenile animals and with the number that were discovered was one of the best records of these animals yet found these bones could be identified as juveniles due to many features in particular their neotennic skulls with proportionally larger eyes and shorter snouts the bones were also nuts fully fused and the centrum at the base of each vertebrae weren't fixed to the neural arch above them all of these traits clearly pointing to these animals being juveniles in the winter after the nest was found in 1978 horner received a package from the daughter-in-law of the rock owner which contained pieces of eggshell and bone fragments from even younger animals that she had found a few hundred meters away from the original nest the original 15 animals found were about a meter long while these new individuals were half their size horner had already come to the conclusion that these larger animals were not hatchlings as the bony tendons that served to stiffen the bones of adults animals were already forming but what was remarkable is that these animals like the smaller hatchlings possessed limb bones that were not fully developed similar to modern outracial bird species that are therefore clumsy in their nests and incapable of walking this led horner to a conclusion that because hatchlings and juvenile animals were present with the latter having doubled in size and still preserved within a nest their inability to get out and find food themselves would have been compromised by their underdeveloped limbs and given how they were still growing it they must have been fed somehow and there was one solution that's being a parent's dinosaur the nests themselves were six feet wide and three feet deep room for the animals to be protected and fed by their parents evidence that they were not left to their own devices and abandoned by their parents to survive on their own like how many would have thought dinosaurs did beforehand these bones were described by the two paleontologists in 1979 also describing a large skull also recovered by the brand volds which was identified as a new species of hadrosaur which having been recovered in close proximity to the discovered ness was associated with the nestlings and vice versa the paleontologists named the species myasura peoblesaurum with the generic name referring to the greek goddess maya the good mother lizard and to emphasize this they used the feminine form of soros that's being sora to further their point with the specific name honoring the families of john and james peebles whose land the fossils were found on the promise of finding more animals led them back to the area the following summer with geologists coming to call the area the willow creek and decline two square miles of badlands that contained rocks dating to around 77 million years ago in the campanian stage of the late cretaceous in what was once the island continent of laramidia beginning in june of 1979 backed by funding by princeton university jack horner robert mackler and around a dozen volunteers returned to the area now beginning a larger and more comprehensive search for new remains over time they found three nests in one day and returned in 1980 and 1991 discovering 8ness in total seemingly a part of a nesting colony this was no coincidence as the team realized something extraordinary about the nests and the geology of the area all of the nests were found on the same level of the undecline within the bottommost layers or horizon meaning that all of these nests would have been made in the same year or season none of the nests were overlapped indicating that it was not one individual returning year after year if that was the case it would be likely that some nests would potentially overlap but this was not seen and the nests were noted to have a remarkable uniform distribution each separated by 7 meters 25 to 30 feet similar to the behavior of grounds nesting birds which instinctively constructs their nests equal distance from one another so that they have enough space to fit the bodies of the parents and from many remains of myosoura animals were themselves around 7 meters long the same as the distance between the nests this was once a colony of nesting dinosaurs with the sites representing one out of countless seasons which would come before and after it over the years hundreds of bones from my asura have also been found allowing paleontologists a unique opportunity to examine individuals across various ages allowing for a very complete picture about their lifestyle to be determined studies led by holly woodward jack horner friedman fowler ettel have resulted in what is perhaps one of the most detailed life histories of any dinosaur known from a sample of 50 individual myosaur tibia a huge sample size compared to that of many other dinosaurs due to their sparse fossil record the paleobiology study examined the fossil bone microstructure or histology of the shin bones revealing aspects of growth that would otherwise not be able to be obtained by simply looking at the shape of the bones such as growth rates metabolism age of death sexual maturity skeletal maturity and how long it would have taken to reach adult size it was found that myosora had a mortality rate of around 89.9 percent in their first year of life down to their small size and lack of defense and if they managed to survive to their second year and beyond their mortality would drop to 12.7 percent the animals would then spend their next six years maturing and growing with sexual maturity found to occur in their third year with skeletal maturity being obtained at eight years of age that's being said many of these older animals would then either die of old age predation and or illness with their mortality rates jumping up to 44 percent at the oldest ages of 12 to because of this quick growth it indicates that these animals would have been warm-blooded with their bone tissue resembling that of modern large-bodied mammals like elk and a more bird-like growth rate before the discovery of myasura and other such finds dinosaurs were still largely perceived as sluggish animals that would have simply deposited their eggs and left them to their own devices and with their discovery it showed that at the time at least one dinosaur species many more of which are now known today took care of their young changing the way the world perceived not just dinosaurs but modern reptiles as well the genus of myosaurus showcased how complex behaviors and lifestyles commonly associated with avian dinosaurs and mammals were also applied with the non-avian dinosaurs and like the previously mentioned dinonicus changed the way how dinosaurs were perceived with dinonicus being important for their anastomy and myosora being important for their behavior both key factors in reshaping our understanding of these animals it is no wonder then that maya sora even though not being among the more extravagant dinosaurs is the state fossil of montana renewing scientific interest in the two medicine formation and even having the honor of being the first dinosaur to have their remains brought up into space while the dinosaur bird's connection through findings like archaeopteryx and dinonicus continued to strengthen the presence of feathers in dinosaurs was still unknown and aside from a few speculative pieces of art dinosaurs were still depicted largely as scaly animals and the connection to birds was not always too apparent this all changed when a tremendously important fossil was found in northeastern china that's dated from the early cretaceous period in the yushan formation in the lyoning province a member of the jeholbyota being among the first dinosaurs to be discovered in the formation the first fossil specimen of this dinosaur was uncovered in the august of 1996 by lee human a farmer and part-time fossil hunter who often prospected around the province to acquire fossils to sell to individuals and museums he noted the unique quality of the specimen which was separated into two slabs selling them to two separate museums in china the national geological museum in beijing and the nanjing institutes of geology and paleontology the director of the beijing museum ji xiang managed to recognize the importance of the find as did visiting canadian paleontologist phil curry and artist michael skripnik who became aware of the fossils by chance as they explored the beijing museum's collections after leading a fossil tour of the area during the first week of october of the same year the fossil was found and sold curry recognized the significance of the fossil immediately and stated that when i saw this slab of siltstone mixed with volcanic ash in which the creature is embedded i was bowled over claiming it to also be one of the most exciting discoveries in decades with another researcher stating it to be the most important dinosaur discovery of the century chinese authorities initially barred photographs of the specimen from publication however curry managed to bring a photograph to the 1996 meeting of the society of versailles paleontology at the american museum of natural history in new york causing crowds of paleontologists to gather and discuss the new discovery john ostrom who was also attending had his eyes welling up with tears and in a state of shock was no doubt relieved that the dinosaur bird connection he had spent years trying to claim was seemingly resolved for good the find was found in rocks from the early aptian stage of the early cretaceous around 124.6 to 122 million years ago the remains were given the name of sinisaropteryx primer meaning the first chinese reptilian wing in reference to its status as the first dinosaur taxon outside of avialae to be found with the evidence of feathers the body was noted to be covered in a cause of what appeared to be of simple filament-like feathers of which all described specimens possess having been preserved along the back half of the skull arms neck back as well as the top and bottom of the tail additional patches of feathers have also been identified on the sides of the body and paleontologists chin don and shin proposed that the density of the feathers on the back and the randomness of the patches elsewhere on the body indicated that the animals would have been fully feathered in life further confirming the extent to which they possessed this integument controversy did however spring up after the discovery was announced as the identity of the filaments preserved were called into question the most notable critic was paleontologist alan feducia who yet to examine the specimen wrote in adebono magazine that the structures of sinosauropteryx were stiffening structures from a frill running along the back similar to aquatic lizards and that's the other paleontologists were engaging in wishful thinking when equating the structures with feathers feducia's through argument was made in several more publications in which other researchers also found the feathers to be that of collagen fibres and seemed to refute the proposal of feathers altogether despite this many researchers have disagreed with this identification and the team of scientists that reported the presence of pigmentation cells in the structures which i will get to shortly argued that the preservation of these cells proved that the structures were feathers and loss of collagen as the latter does not contain a pigment with gregory s paul re-identifying what the collagen hypothesis proponents consider a body outline outside of the fibers as an artifact of preparation that's being through breakage and brushed on sealant that was misidentified as the outline of the body the hypothesis that the structures were collagen based was closely analyzed and subsequently disproved by a 2017 paper published by smithwick ethel with the integument of sinosauropteryx being compared to the less controversial evidence of collagen fibers preserved in the ichthyosaur stenopterygius although the collagen hypothesis claimed that the central shafts of the purported theropod filaments were actually misidentified examples of shafts like collagen fibres higher quality imagery showed that the similarities were artificial the supposed shafts in ichthyosaur collagen were actually scratch marks cracks and crevices created during the preparation of one of the ichthyosaur specimens on the other hand the shafts of the sinister optoric structures were legitimate examples of fossilized structures the collagen hypothesis also claimed that sinisteropteryx integuments included beaded structures similar to structures occasionally found in decaying collagen of modern sea mammals however this claim was also unsupported with smithwickel finding no evidence of the beaded structures which the collagen hypothesis proponents had identified the study concluded with saying that some of the areas of the fossil preserved in three dimensions cast shadows which would have resembled these so-called beaded structures in low-quality photographs the frill or halo of collagen identified by feducia was also determined to be misidentified sediments surrounding one of the specimens and other purported collagen fibres in the tail area were also revealed to be scratches something that made sinisteropteryx even more remarkable was that as well as being the first non-avian dinosaur described with feathers it was also the first where structures that included discoloration had been preserved and identified some paleontologists upon the finding of sineseropteryx found an alternation of lighter and darker bands preserved on the tail with paleontologist lick longridge suggesting that the specimens actually preserved remnants of the coloration pattern animals would have exhibited in life he noted that the dark banded areas on the tail were too evenly spaced to have been caused by random separation of the fossil slabs and that they represented fossilized pigments present in the feathers a first in paleontology long rich's conclusions were supported in a paper published in the journal nature in 2010 when scientists examined the fossilized feathers of several dinosaurs and early birds finding evidence that they preserved melanosomes the cells that give feathers their colouration by examining a melanosome structure and its distribution jan and his colleagues were able to confirm the presence of dark and light bands of colour on the tail feathers of sinisaropteryx and by comparing melanosome types to those of modern birds they determined that from the presence of phthalo melanosomes concluded that the darker feathers of sinosauropteryx were chestnuts or reddish brown in colour with a light banded tail further research also revealed the possession of a raccoon-like mask and counter-shading patterns with this study associating this with adaptations for an open environment although some have criticized this notion as other animals with similar coloration dentition and size have been noted to be more well suited and found in closed habitats the excellent preservation of sinosauropteric specimens has also revealed what sinosauropteryx is and the inner workings of their reproduction prey animals include a number of small lizards and mammals with a possible specimen being found with three mammal jaws in its gut region with two being identified as belonging to zhang heotherium and the third to sinobitar with the former being known to have a spur on the ankle like the modern placipus which indicated that sinisteropteryx likely risks in a venomation are to obtain their food another remarkable detail is the confirmation that dinosaurs at least those related to sinosauropteryx possessed two oviducts not the one like in modern birds this is implied by the preservation of two developed eggs in a specimen that had also preserved a lizard in its stomach contents which were preserved just in front of and above the pubic boot with each egg measuring 36 millimeters by 26 millimeters wide in size these eggs helps confirm the theory that eggs once associated with the related compsognathus did not belong to this dinosaur as the eggs in question were only 10 millimeters long much smaller than those found in cinesropteryx all in all the discovery of sinisaropteryx was a revolutionary and highly important discovery as it's called into questioner that the first feathers evolved not for flights but for insulation and that's they were also present in relatively basal dinosaur lineages that were not the direct ancestors of avialae and gave credence to the idea that more non-avian dinosaurs might have also possessed feathers an assumption which would later be reinforced by many more amazing discoveries xenosraptorix was also the first non-avian dinosaur to have their coloration assessed and managed to answer the critics of the dinosaur bird connection who sought evidence for feathers and or filaments in non-avian dinosaurs to prove their otherwise unsubstantiated claims in conclusion i thank you for watching this rather long video on the most important discoveries in paleontology of the 20th century the time period really was an incredible time for the field as over time the field became transformed with an increased understanding of the distant past and how far it extended as well as revelations about how extinct animals appeared in life and how they behaved and survived as well as this the beginnings of the internet made it easier for people interested in the field to get engaged with the science something that would become much more widespread and apparent in the upcoming 21st century which will be covered in the third and final installments of this series with that said i'm glad to have finally got this video out and hopefully parts 3 shouldn't take nearly as long as the distance between the first and second videos and with that i'll see you next time whenever that's maybe [Music] so [Music] you

Channel: Henry the PaleoGuy

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Keywords: Paleontology, Palaeontology, Documentary, The, Most, Important, Discoveries, The Most Important Discoveries in Paleontology, Part 2, Fossils, Discovery, Zoology, Biology, Anatomy, La Brea Tar Pits, Tyrannosaurus, Rex, Burgess Shale, Taung Child, Deinonychus, Dinosaur renaissance, Maiasaura, Sinosauropteryx, Colour, Ben G Thomas, TREY the Explainer, T.rex, Dinosaurs, Dinosaur, Evolution, Extinct, History, Timeline, Science, Nature, 20th Century, Australopithecus, Anthropology, Neanderthal, Neanderthals, Museum, News

Id: NVQJ00CFiU4

Length: 62min 30sec (3750 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 11 2020