A chunk of Weald Clay from SE England, covered with fragments of ferns, conifers and other seed plants from 130 million years ago. Mesofossils may not look as appealing as large hand specimens, but can provide a better snapshot of vegetation. #FossilFriday ⚒🌏🌱🔬🌿🌲

For #fossilfriday, The New York Times has written a good article about the Paleontological Research Institution, what the museum means to the field of Paleontology, and its current financial situation (much improved even from a few weeks ago). 🧪🦑⚒️🦣 #paleontology www.nytimes.com/2025/12/19/s...

Apparently Bill Simpson, longtime Collections Manager of fossil vertebrates at the ⁦‪@FieldMuseum‬⁩ in Chicago, is retiring—after 46 yrs! Bill has always been so helpful, including pulling out the skull of ⁦‪@SUEtheTrex‬⁩ for study multiple times! Happy Retirement, Bill! 🎥: Emily Rieff #FossilFriday

Nice new study by Martinez & Jenkins on procolophonid #parareptile tooth morphology & dietary #evolution ⬇️ Great to see their quantitative comparison to living reptiles 🦎 to infer procolophonid feeding habits 🍽️ #Paleontology #Science #Permian #Triassic www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

A somewhat festive snapshot for this last #FossilFriday before Christmas! 🎄 - Presenting Sophie the #Stegosaurus, one of the most complete stegosaur skeletons ever found, proudly on display front & centre in the Earth Hall at the @nhm-london.bsky.social. #Paleontology #Science 🧵 1/

New #paleoart on #FossilFriday: #Tiktaalik sees the world. Discussions of early #tetrapods often focus on limbs and lungs, but major changes also took place in their eyes. Seeing further and clearer than any animal before, they were the first to clearly see sunsets, stars, and the moon. #sciart

The Vertebrate Paleontology students did a great job 3D printing and painting skulls—look at that homology!

In the early Devonian #lungfishes — now considered "living fossils" — were all the rage! A new #fish from China attests to this early diversification. www.cell.com/current-biol...

Excited to announce that my second manuscript, “Fossilised Melanosomes Reveal Colour Patterning in A Sauropod Dinosaur” has been published in @royalsociety.org !! Diplodocus scales are complex and diverse, and it turns out their color patterning was even more so. A 🧵🦕 1/26

New paper! Here we look at shape evolution of the mandible in Pelagiaria, a group of open-ocean fishes that includes tuna and mackerel. We find that shape disparity accumulated rapidly at the origin of the clade at around the K/Pg boundary... academic.oup.com/evlett/advan...

Interesting new paper by Alfonso-Rojas et al. on #anaconda 🐍 size #evolution using fossils from Venezuela 🇻🇪 - they suggest giant anacondas are survivors from the radiation of giant vertebrates in South America during the Miocene ⬇️ #Paleontology #Science #Snakes www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Press release for my "Bringing Up Baby" paper finally out! cmns.umd.edu/news-events/...

Great opportunity for ECRs, especially those with tight funding! ⬇️ Did a couple courses with @tscourses.bsky.social when I was a PhD student & would thoroughly recommend! #PhD #Postdoc #ResearchSkills #ScienceTraining #ProfessionalDevelopment

Anyone considering doing a #PhD with us at the OU in life science or #environment ILESLA is a fantastic opportunity to take part in a world class PhD training programme, find out more this Wednesday

A small selection of snapshots from #2025SVP last week for this #FossilFriday! This was my first @societyofvertpaleo.bsky.social meeting since 2022 & it was fantastic to see so many friends & colleagues after so long. Presented my latest research & forged new connections - much exciting work ahead!

🚨 Save #Geology & #Paleobiology at Leicester Uni! 🚨 @uniofleicester.bsky.social bosses plan to dissolve the #EarthSciences dept. & entirely AXE the Centre for Palaeobiology & Biosphere Evolution & ALL of its academic staff. Please sign the petition to help halt these plans ✍️⬇️ c.org/8wDkwRBsgp

PGRs Amy Shipley (@sauropodlets.bsky.social) & Lydia Woods recently published a review in @globalchangebio.bsky.social showing that while today’s extinction rates aren't yet at "Big Five" mass extinction levels, they’re likely the highest seen in the last 66myrs. amdunhill.co.uk/2025/11/17/n...

Great to see Prof. Mike Benton awarded the Romer-Simpson medal from @societyofvertpaleo.bsky.social. Mike’s been an incredible teacher & mentor to me & so many others - I’m v. glad to see his enormous contribution to the knowledge & people of our field honoured here tonight 🏅 #2025SVP #paleontology

Tomorrow I’ll be presenting my latest research at #2025SVP on eco-environmental drivers of crocodyliform 🐊 #macroevolution in South America! Stop by to see some of the current work at @openuniversity.bsky.social on Amazonian biodiversity, supported by @leverhulme.ac.uk ⬇️ #Paleontology #Science

Super excited to welcome the world’s vertebrate palaeontologists to the historic Aston Webb building of the University of Birmingham. Hope you enjoyed yourselves #2025SVP

Always enjoy conferences as they’re great opportunities for old lab mates to catch up - grand to see old friends after such a long while! #2025SVP

Cool new FEA study from Srinivas et al. on crocodyliform skull biomechanical constraints and the #evolution of ancient terrestrial forms & modern, semi-aquatic #crocodiles. 🐊⬇️ #Paleontology #Science royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

Info day on the world-leading @ilesla.bsky.social #PhD programme on 26th Nov. iles.web.ox.ac.uk/open-day-2025 fantastic opportunity to do a PhD with us here at Open University and take full advantage of the ILESLA training at Oxford at the same time @palaeosingh.bsky.social

Mark Norell (1957–2025): Current Biology www.cell.com/current-biol...

📣Another exciting PhD available! Partnered with @nottswildlife.bsky.social and fully funded by the ACCE+ NERC Doctoral Landscape Award. We will look at morphological trait evolution, isolation and environment change, and rewilding of large herbivores. #evolution #WilderFuture #rewilding #PhD

#DinoConUK is coming to #Birmingham! Join us in 2026 at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole on July 25th-26th for the second DinoConUK. Events have yet to be announced (and tickets are not yet on sale) but places can be booked at the hotel. Talks, shows, events, vendors and more :) Please share!

Given the new paper yesterday, here’s the skull of a #Nanotyrannus for this #FossilFriday. Once widely thought to be a juvenile #Tyrannosaurus rex, this dinosaur is now recognised as a separate genus & not even a tyrannosaurid! 🦖 #Paleontology #Science #Dinosaurs 🧵 1/

After lots of rumours of an impending #Nanotyrannus paper, here we are! Zanno & Napoli support Nanotyrannus as a true genus & not a juvenile #Tyrannosaurus rex 🦖 Final paper still a little way off yet, but the manuscript is live ⬇️ #Dinosaurs #Paleontology #Science www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Fraser, D., Rybczynski, N., Gilbert, M. et al. Mid-Cenozoic rhinocerotid dispersal via the North Atlantic. Nat Ecol Evol (2025). doi.org/10.1038/s415...

Central Asian radiation of modern large-mammal faunas in Miocene | Science Advances www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

A side-on snapshot of the skull of Megacerops, a #brontothere (‘thunder beast’) from North America for this #FossilFriday. Sporting large bulbous horns, these large, ancient mammals looked a bit like rhinos 🦏 but are actually more closely related to horses 🐎. #Paleontology #Science #Cenozoic 🧵1/

Nice thread below on new paper by Flynn et al. ⬇️ Great to have another end-Cretaceous fossil fauna from North America! Combined with new analytical methods & approaches, should help us understand what was going on with #dinosaur 🦖 diversity before the asteroid impact ☄️ #paleontology #science

This is an INCREDIBLE advance in our understanding of coral diversification. 🪸🎉 Fantastic new work led by @claudiavaga.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

New paper on crocodylian locomotor evolution led by Masaya Iijima, w/Richard Blob & me! More erect hindlimb postures help extant gators support their weight (esp. at ankle), & how these mechanics constrained giant Deinosuchus to a slow walk at best! The paper-- www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Exciting new #PhD studentship available on flowering plant & insect #evolution in South America 🌺🐝 across the Cenozoic using biodiversity & #palaeoclimate modelling 🖥️ Join our growing #palaeobiology research group at @openuniversity.bsky.social! See below for more project & application info ⬇️

N.G. McDonald et al. 2025 Triassic-Jurassic Lake-Shoreline Environments of the Hartford and Deerfield Basins: Fossils, Food Chains, and Facies-Linked Distribution of Dinosaur Tracks and Trackmakers. Bull. Peabody Museum of Natural History 66, 339-381, doi.org/10.3374/014....

😍 www.youtube.com/watch?v=9i0R...

Hechenleitner, E.M., Martinelli, A.G., Rocher, S. et al. A long-necked early dinosaur from a newly discovered Upper Triassic basin in the Andes. Nature (2025). doi.org/10.1038/s415...

New paper by Martínez et al. describing a new basal theropod #dinosaur 🦖 from the Late #Triassic of Argentina 🇦🇷 alongside an analysis of faunal assemblages that helps clarify how early dinosaurs diversified & expanded their ecological roles ⬇️ #Paleontology #Science www.nature.com/articles/s41...

On this #fossilfriday, take a few moments to read this. A touching tribute to the life, career, and discoveries of Mark Norell, from his long-time friend and field companion, Mike Novacek. In @nature.com www.nature.com/articles/d41...

A couple snapshots of an ancient apex predator for this #FossilFriday - presenting the fossil teeth & snout of an #Erythrosuchus africanus, the big-headed, hypercarnivorous archosauromorph from the Early-Mid #Triassic of South Africa 🇿🇦 #Paleontology #Science 🧵 1/

Animated Scutellosaurus!! (Also Dilophosaurus, prosauropods, and dimorphodonts, but I think I've seen animations of all those before...) youtu.be/BYCjeNQvISM?...

For #FossilFriday, in honor of the 120th naming of both species (tomorrow), the type specimens of Tyrannosaurus rex (at the Carnegie Museum) and Albertosaurus sarcophagus (@museumofnature)

Here’s a snapshot of the basal tyrannosaurid, Lythronax argestes for this #FossilFriday. It lived ~80 Ma, making it a much older cousin of the famous, #Tyrannosaurus rex 🦖- Discovered in Southern Utah 🇺🇸, its name means "gore king from the southwest." #Paleontology #Science #Dinosaurs 🧵 1/

New paper by Degrange et al. reports a new phorusrhacid (AKA #TerrorBird) from La Venta, Colombia 🇨🇴 - this is the 2nd terror bird from the site, suggesting perhaps some niche partitioning between these giant avian predators ⬇️ #Paleontology #Science www.mdpi.com/1424-2818/17...

New paper by Niedźwiedzki et al. reports ichnofossil 👣🐾 assemblage apparently made by ornithischian & megatheropod #dinosaurs in the latest #Triassic. Lots of interesting new info on the early rise of dinosaurs coming out of Poland! 🇵🇱 ⬇️ #Paleontology #Science www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Presenting the skull of #Ceratosaurus nasicornis for this #FossilFriday. This medium-sized (up to ~5.5 metres long), theropod dinosaur 🦖 was one of the rarer & perhaps most enigmatic predators of the #Jurassic Morrison Formation in the southwestern US 🇺🇸 #Paleontology #Science 🧵 1/

New paper by Mao et al. describes divergent approaches to evolving a secondary jaw joint in two #Jurassic mammaliamorphs from China 🇨🇳 - Seems there was quite a bit of morphological experimentation in such proto- #mammals! ⬇️ #Paleontology #Science www.nature.com/articles/s41...