One of the things I've talked about when it comes to depicting ornithischians with rostral beaks is the assumption that because there is a beak on the mandible, inferred from the predentary's mere existence, there must be one on the premaxilla (or they reinvent the rostral bone to suit). 1/Thread

If it helps to visualize the Muttaburrasaurus "concha," this is how I saw it, based on the 3D models made of it by the recent study authors: First, A, cylinder. Which is stretched, B, on one side into an aerofoil. Which is then pinched, C, to make a boxy "balloon." A typical balloon, D, compared.

A Very Peculiar Ornithopod. #SciArt #Dinosaur #ornithischian #elasmarian_or_thescelosaur_who-knows? #Australia An attempt at modeling the skull and its particular nasal "conch" (and I'm likely to get flak for that term, but it's better than "vestibule, which the structure certainly isn't").

Pierre Bourdieu once argued that the question of whether something is art isn't answered by the artist's intention or even the object itself. Instead, the quality of being "art" is conferred by a community — curators, dealers, auction houses, audiences, etc. 🧵

Shit like this is why god doesn’t talk to us anymore

Qianosuchus, a.k.a: Spinosaurus but cool a VERY long, muscular tail (often not seen in art!), giant shoulder girdles and scleral rings, numerous diminute osteoderms, an overall amazing insight into poposauroid evolution, specimens exquisitely preserved! A one-of-a-kind animal

It wasn't a book, per se. It was PBS. It was Reading Rainbow, which let me begin to enjoy reading and delve into worlds not my pen, imagining a better life in which I lived. 100% true. I wish I could more than thank Levarr Burton, and I cannot thank Mr Rogers in person for fighting for PBS.

Yes, one down! The Ganzhou oviraptorid "complex" has largely consisted of scrappy parts of skulls, some few large specimens of distinct taxa, and a lot of juvenile/immatures. We've known some of this for a long time, but specimen analysis hasn't quite caught up with hypotheses.

In a nutshell. 😊

I believe that in order to take some small step forward, the word “bird” should be replaced with “saur” in all common names. Mockingsaur. Secretarysaur. Red-winged blacksaur. HUMMINGSAUR

everyone is so mean 2 me💔

This is like where @georgetakei.bsky.social tells Christian Slater slater to gun it to save Kirk from Kang in the best Star Trek movie.

Man Who Threw Molotov Cocktail At Sam Altman’s Home Claims He Was Following ChatGPT Recipe For Risotto https://theonion.com/man-who-threw-molotov-cocktail-at-sam-altmans-home-claims-he-was-following-chatgpt-recipe-for-risotto/

Did you know that while Allosaurus and Apatosaurus explored eachother's bodies in the Morrison Formation, small, bipedal, omnivorous crocodylomorphs with spoon-like jaws were running around on the forest's floor?

If I had one [major] problem with the Herne et al paper, it's this. No, the reconstruction is fine: it fits the image and ideas the paper presents, and there's evidence being forwarded to support the conditions: A big cheek muscle, with the rictus of the mouth VERY anterior, and a large upper beak.

Volume and compression-corrected skull of Muttaburrasaurus langdoni, after the new paper. The nose presents a conundrum: a separate object in the nasal vault distinct from the nasal bone, but with uncertain affinities to the premaxilla. Termed a "prenasal," that's WAAY better than "postpremaxilla."

One of the more interesting things about the new Muttaburrasaurus paper by Herne et al (OA in PeerJ! link in the comments), is how the new study comports with some OTHER animals with odd ossified thingies in their nasal passages. peerj.com/articles/207...

This is schadenfreude, in case any Americans were curious what it means.

One day, "It" will happen, by which I mean sudden and unexpected news that you want to celebrate. In such cases, you will want the right outfit. 🧵

Taking a break from quiz grading to stand on a soap box for a moment. So, with apologies to George Box: All species concepts are wrong; some species concepts are in this thread.

I love this, and it's my current favorite sci-fi movie.

Only three words...

Cavasin, Cerda, and Apesteguía (2026). Bone microstructure of the beak-like structure of the herbivorous sphenodontian Priosphenodon avelasi (Lepidosauria). Cretaceous Research (advanced online, pre-proof): www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I’m guilty of this too but the fact that I’ve seen an order of magnitude more art and discussion of Spinosaurus mirabilis than Haolong says a lot about the dinosaur palaeontology community and where our biases are. Haolong is inarguably more important, but it’s received a fraction of the attention.

It's remarkable how GOOD of a person Mr. Fred Rogers was. How truly honest, irrepressible, yet somehow actually GOOD, he was. I thought no person could be above such evil as I grew up with in the late 80s-early 90s, but he was that person, and he made his environment comforting for someone like me.

The clouds on this are TERRIBLE

To quote John Lewis: "Get in good trouble." To also quote John Lewis: "Freedom is not a state; it is an act… Freedom is the continuous action we all must take, and each generation must do its part to create an even more fair, more just society." Pretending the US was fair once implies we're done

Just in time for #FossilFriday, meet Rhynchaeites mcfaddeni, a little fossil ibis from the Green River Formation. The holotype looks delightfully like a hieroglyph! Published today in Journal of Paleontology shorturl.at/qTUVi

Did some work for Dr. Dan Ksepka on some neat fossil birds. Nice to see the creative way the team that just published this paper put these two together.

ceratopsid noses are really, really weird. Preserved as giant empty spaces inside the skull, only the external features (the narial fossa, the bony nostril) get mentioned. But we've known for a long time that there had to be other things in there. (This shouldn't influence reconstruction much)

Excited to see this article led by @seishirotada.bsky.social out in @anatrecord.bsky.social. Triceratops and their ceratopsian kin are more than horns and frills! Check out their narial regions! doi.org/10.1002/ar.7...

Dinosaurs Survived! All 15 designs so far. www.emmalerae.com/store.html

A succinct rephrasing of an important message from a former comics person, so know what the actual quote is. Power carries responsibility, and the greater the one, the greater the other. Those who abrogate the latter, don't cry when you lose the former. Read the thread.

The silence from the established (and largely male, white) paleo folks to whom I have given much respect and admiration over the last few decades to the notorious and now blatant misconduct of "one of their own," infamous Jack Horner, reaffirms my step away from academia. Sorry, but not sorry.

When that handy dandy Geology degree comes in handy...

To the authoritarian, if it's not adulatory, glorifying, and to be clear it has to be the *right kind of such*, then it's inherently *hostile*. Any attempt to hold this administration accountable will be deemed "violent." This, from the self-described "domestic terrorists" now on the loose.

One of the best things I’ve read in a while:

Dsung Intersex Crest I believe that the original sketch (made a few years ago) was brought on by my anger at the invisibility of intersex people in the public eye, along with how their parents often treat them. I had no idea what to do for the background tbh #dsungaripterus #Pterosaur #paleoart

so don't get too comfortable. #art

Art is never done, it's only at some stage of "I can live with it"

Our paper on the mysterious Devonian organism Prototaxites has now finally been published! See the paper here (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...) and our explainer thread below! Prototaxites reconstruction by Matt Humpage

From an outsider's standpoint, this sure does look like an externally grooved, probably spike-bearing bone, doesn't it? Surprise, it's a human kneecap, os patella, an ossified sesamoid. These bones are often embedded, and formed within, muscles and their associated tendons, alleviating strain.

Hiya, I have 4 more school fact file sheets for #FossilFriday: #Tianyulong, #Darwinopterus, #Oregramma, and #Caytonia! These are really relaxing to do, and I plan on doing more plants next! I hope you like them! #paleontology #paleobotany #paleoart #sciart #scicomm #schoolwork #publiccommunication

I'm making a series of infographics at the moment for some school groups, and, honestly, I'm really enjoying it!!! They're learning about paleontology, and I was asked if I could provide some images of extinct plants and animals! Here are the first few: #paleoart #scicomm #education #paleontology

The US has been protesting foreign involvement and genocide in foreign countries since its founding. One might, through some marshalling of esoteric knowledge, infer it's been happening since before, too. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_St...

There are things today we can't do. Stop worrying about them for now. Not forever; just for now. There are things today we can do. Focus on that. There are people who need help -- let's focus on them. Each morrow, we take what we can do, and do it. With what we can't, put them aside. Breathe.

Apatosaurus fights torvosaurus!

I should add I left out the next most obvious contrary possibility: that the ossifications are, to some degree, sesamoids. One of the "spikes" occurs in aplace that makes it very hard to use as a "spike," between two digits. It's worth thinking about and testing against, even if not conclusive.