Our latest paper, now how to conciliate apparently discrepant evolutionary rate patterns in squamates, but which may well apply to any study system with Stephanie Pierce and @7brumas.bsky.social #macroevolution academic.oup.com/sysbio/advan...

🐍🦎 We're all familiar with snakes, but have you heard of legless lizards? Join Collections Manager Nefti Camacho behind the scenes in the Museum's Herpetology Collection and learn the similarities and differences between the two species!

Do you need a good paleo podcast to start your weekend? 🤔 In this interview with Science Moab, NHMU's Randy Irmis, Curator of Paleontology, discusses his research on the Chinle Formation located in southern Utah. Listen here! ➡️ sciencemoab.org/utahs-chinle...

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Physical traits, habitat, and geological processes are primary factors influencing the completeness of lizard, snake, and mosasaur fossils, shaping our understanding of reptile evolution. doi.org/g94m65

It’s finally out! Extremely pleased to share the last chapter of my dissertation to be published! In this study, we take a deep dive into the 242 million-year squamate 🦎🐍 fossil record to quantify factors that lead to the mostly fragmentary specimens in collections today: doi.org/10.1017/pab....

UPDATE: The 2025-2026 list of faculty and postdoc positions in ecology and evolutionary biology is out! Be sure to check out this active and helpful community run resources! docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

Attention students: the deadline for our fall collections study award coming up soon! Use the funds to come out and use our LACM specimens for your research.

Dinosaurs as ecosystem engineers! Weaver, L.N., Tobin, T.S., Sprain, C.J. et al. Dinosaur extinction can explain continental facies shifts at the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary. Commun Earth Environ 6, 712 (2025). doi.org/10.1038/s432...

Diverging trends in erythrocyte size elucidate cardiovascular evolution in stem #dinosaurs and #crocodilians #ProcB #Palaeobiology #Evolution royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

To celebrate a momentous 10 Years of #DinoFest, we’re looking back at a decade of discoveries from the Mesozoic—the period from about 252 to 66 million years ago, when dinosaurs evolved and then came to rule the planet: go.nhm.org/dinofest10 🦖 Will you be joining us this Sunday, September 14?

Devon knows how they made it so teeny: the fossil of a very small rhynchocephalian from the Triassic of Devon, UK, is the oldest known lepidosaur and sheds light on the early history of this important and species-rich tetrapod group. @nature.com www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Love how being sprawling-legged ectotherms does absolutely nothing to stop lizards from sometimes doing this:

Some 40 million years ago, northern Europe was covered by what is known as the Baltic Amber Forest, now known only from pieces of amber found on the coastline. An illustration from my recent article in the magazine Suomen Luonto, based on research by Dr. Eva-Maria Sadowski. cara.app/post/6e6ed80...

🦖 Sunday, September 14, join us as we celebrate our 10th Annual #DinoFest! Peek into the prehistoric past of dinosaurs, hear from world-renowned paleontologists, see unique Cretaceous era fossil collections, Special Screenings, and more: nhm.org/dinofest

October 1 deadline for @nhm.org Student Collections Study Award. Get some $$ to spend time collecting data in our collections, including @tarpits.org Open to: - current undergraduate and grad students - *not* local to Los Angeles (international applicants welcome) More: nhm.org/student-coll... 🧪

It's been online for a month but now in final format: a new paper I'm on is out today! We analyzed over 200 features from the bird wing and shoulder girdle skeleton to see how they're distributed across the bird family tree. academic.oup.com/iob/advance-... 🪶🧪 (📷 @fieldpalaeo.bsky.social)

New killer croc from the end of the Cretaceous in Patagonia: dx.plos.org/10.1371/jour...

It’s finally out! Our work addressing the origins of reptiles is published in PCJ! peercommunityjournal.org/articles/10.... We use novel info gleaned from the scan data of dozens of stem reptiles to substantially revise our understanding of early reptile evolution #paleontology #herpetology

Microbial mats in dinosaur ichnocoenoses - Noffke - Sedimentology - Wiley Online Library onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

🌱 BHL’s Call for Support soft-closes on Aug 31. 🧪 With @clirnews.bsky.social as our new fiscal sponsor, we now have an administrative & financial home, but we still need partners, hosts, funders & long-term investment to secure BHL's future. about.biodiversitylibrary.org/call-for-sup... #ILoveBHL

Important read by @thomsanger.bsky.social for anyone in science. academic.oup.com/icb/advance-...

An ultra-wealthy fossil enthusiast could make more impact in the progress of paleo-science through supportive philanthropy, rather than simply adding another trophy to their estate. Investment in exploration outmatches the quiet vanity of personal acquisition. theconversation.com/fossils-are-...

If anyone is interested in going to grad school in paleo, I run a workshop series that will walk you through the process. It’s through the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology and it’s free! DM me if interested.

Body size, not habitat or sex, best explains the extent of #ultraviolet fluorescence in African dwarf chameleons zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... #biofluorescence #chameleons #UV

Meet the blue tree monitor (Varanus macraei)! Growing up to 3.6 ft (1.1 m) long, it can be found only on the Indonesian island of Batanta. This arboreal reptile uses its prehensile tail—which is nearly twice the length of its body—to assist with climbing. Photo: Josh More, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0, flickr

A new article is out on our microplastics work at NHMLAC. Check it out. caseagrant.ucsd.edu/news/fish-ti...

This #watercolor #paleoart from around 2018(?) is of #Tylosaurus about to scavenge a dead younger/smaller individual. 🦎🌊 Reminder mosasaurs weren’t dinosaurs, but actually marine lizards, closely related to snakes and monitors. (Honestly just as cool)

A dinosaur fossil has been found in an unlikely place, a hole drilled under the parking lot of a Colorado museum where dinosaur skeletons are on display.

Foundations: please step up and take over the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL). This is an absolutely essential scanned archive of all of the old journals and books from the 1500s to about 1920. Has been indispensable for my research. about.biodiversitylibrary.org/call-for-sup...

So disappointing. Biodiversity Heritage Library has been a CRUCIAL resource for my work and countless others.

Everyone, please meet Sphenodraco! A newly described sphenodontian (a tuatara relative) from the Late Jurassic of Europe published TODAY! #paleoart #reptiles #sciart #art

arboreal rhynchocephalian from the Late Jurassic of Germany, and the importance of the appendicular skeleton for ecomorphology in lepidosaurs url: academic.oup.com/zoolinnean/a...

A monster “goblin” at the feet of dinosaurs! Meet the newly discovered giant, armored lizard named for the Hobbit’s goblin prince: go.nhm.org/bolgoblin

The NSF is in trouble. Here is my latest substack post: open.substack.com/pub/artediso... @standupforscience.bsky.social

Report: National Science Foundation headquarters to be taken over by HUD, displacing 1,800+ employees www.alxnow.com/2025/06/24/r...

Checkout this article I found at PLOS: dx.plos.org/10.1371/jour...

A little #Scicomm for your Tuesday, CLAM STYLE I was invited to talk Big Dead Clams with the @burkemuseum.bsky.social and my friend @pinuppaleontology.bsky.social to answer some good, lingering questions about Chowder, the Platyceramus that we got to them last year. 🧪🦪 youtu.be/AGHiOofpB5U

A tizard study led to a drug now used by millions. Yet federal cuts threaten that spark—and with it future innovation. Don’t destroy the seeds of change & growth. Protect public research. zurl.co/QhSRQ

Reptiles of the Early Triassic Beaufort Group (mostly the Katberg Formation) of South Africa (ca. 251 million years ago) Sneak peek at two plates from my book (in preparation) about the tetrapods of the Triassic #paleoart #paleontology #art #reptiles #sciart

It's not only #FossilFriday, but also the 50th Anniversary of Jaws 🦈 one of my favorite movies. I'm celebrating by sharing this 5 million year old ancestral great white shark fossil from Peru's famed Pisco Formation. *Almost* a modern GWS, it doesn't quite have the tooth serrations of today's.

Another scientific find gets a named inspired by #Tolkien 😀 Bolg amondol: New monstersaur reveals complex evolutionary history of giant Gila monster relatives. phys.org/news/2025-06...

"The bill directs what is likely the largest single sale of national public lands in modern history..." www.wilderness.org/articles/med...

Check out this great article on our research from Dr. Mulcair at @newscientist.com! Had a great time chatting about the Venn Diagram of Nerd-dom that our study encapsulates :) #lizards #paleontology

Introducing: Bolg amondol 🦎 After 20 years in a jar, this prehistoric ancestor of the Gila monster was discovered — and assigned this wicked Tolkienian name. (Forever impressed, Dr. Woolley.) Any fans among us who can figure it out without looking it up? 👀 www.newscientist.com/article/2484...