tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64300357425652480132024-03-19T09:31:06.663+00:00Pterosaur.net BlogUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger99125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-30697633704793928192014-05-14T07:41:00.000+01:002014-05-14T07:41:35.965+01:00A bit more about the AMNH ExhibitMany thanks to Dave Hone for posting the great photos from Steve Cohen of the new AMNH Exhibit. I have been meaning to post about the exhibit over a month now, but April-May is the skeletomuscular course in the medical program at USC, so blogging has been on the back burner.<br />
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In any case, as Dave mentioned, I had a role in the new exhibit. In fact, I had a relatively substantial role. As full disclosure, I was a paid consultant on the exhibit (titled "Pterosaurs: Flight in the Age of Dinosaurs"). I worked with the staff there for a little over a year on the interactive flight simulations, and I did recorded interviews for use in the theater and iPad interactive displays. I also helped rather extensively with the script used for the theater presentation (which is mostly about flight). One thing that neither myself, nor Alex Kellner (the co-curator on the exhibit) were approached about were the promo images. I won't detail any politics on that front now, but some of you may be aware that there some issues that arose on that front. What I can say is that the animation and video folks were not involved in that process, either (and used entirely different models for their reconstructions), nor were the sculptors so far as I am aware. So the promo images seem to be a bit of an isolated entity.<br />
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In any case, the exhibit opened on April 5th, 2014. Here is the official website for the exhibit: http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/current-exhibitions/pterosaurs-flight-in-the-age-of-dinosaurs<br />
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They ran a promo video here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsI8ZtsSVqY">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsI8ZtsSVqY</a><br />
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On April 1st there was a media preview event, with a panel composed of myself, Alex Kellner, Mark Norell and Michael Novacek. It was well attended, and yield quite a bit of press for the exhibit. Some of the popular articles can be found at:<br />
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<span class="s1"><a href="http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/04/140405-pterosaur-flying-reptile-museum-exhibit-paleontology-science/">http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/04/140405-pterosaur-flying-reptile-museum-exhibit-paleontology-science/</a></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/11/arts/design/natural-history-museum-explores-the-wonders-of-pterosaurs.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/11/arts/design/natural-history-museum-explores-the-wonders-of-pterosaurs.html</a></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><a href="http://worldsciencefestival.com/blog/pterosaurs_take_to_the_skies_of_new_york_city">http://worldsciencefestival.com/blog/pterosaurs_take_to_the_skies_of_new_york_city</a></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><a href="http://mentalfloss.com/article/56005/qa-michael-habib-pterosaur-flight-expert">http://mentalfloss.com/article/56005/qa-michael-habib-pterosaur-flight-expert</a></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><a href="http://www.livescience.com/44556-how-pterosaurs-ruled-the-skies.html">http://www.livescience.com/44556-how-pterosaurs-ruled-the-skies.html</a></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><a href="http://mentalfloss.com/article/56021/10-pterosaur-facts-new-exhibit-american-museum-natural-history">http://mentalfloss.com/article/56021/10-pterosaur-facts-new-exhibit-american-museum-natural-history</a></span></div>
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As always, there is some variation in the quality of coverage, but overall I thought the writers did a good job of talking up the exhibit while hitting some of the interesting science involved. There will likely be more coming from Scientific American, as well, since I have chatted with them pretty extensively in the weeks following the opening (but more on that when the article(s) hit print).</div>
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Some things to look forward to in the exhibit (which stays at the AMNH through early January, at which point it will travel to other museums):</div>
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- Excellent specimens. Dave covered this already (see previous post) so I won't belabor it here. They have some awesome stuff, though (including the Dark Wing, which is on display outside Europe for the first time).</div>
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- Motion capture interactive animations that allow you to control launch, feeding, and flight in Pteranodon and Jeholopterus. The floating position of the Pteranodon was originally quite bird-like. It was updated using the floating paper by Hone and Henderson at my suggestion. The Pteranodon launch is a water launch and looks pretty wicked. The flight simulation includes basic physics like stall, L:D ratio transitions, and basic rate of climb estimates.</div>
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- A full-scale fleshed out reconstruction of Quetzalcoatlus northropi hanging from the ceiling just above reach, with a cutaway to show plausible flight muscle attachment. It's a great sculpture. Sadly, it came together just a little too soon to incorporate the updated proportions from my project with David Krentz. They did, however, feature David's 3D digital model on a sign near the sculpture showing how our reconstructions of Quetzalcoatlus have evolved over time.</div>
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- An amazing sculpture diorama (full size) of Tupuxuara - the models are by Jason Brougham, who is fantastic at paleo-reconstruction. The pair is shown feeding on fish in a traditional pluck-grab mode. As some know, Mark Witton and I both prefer an alternative ecology for these animals, but the sculptures are still magnificent (and to be fair, their feeding ecology is contentious - they can't just side with me every time). </div>
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If you are in NYC, the exhibit is well worth a visit (the specimens alone make it worthwhile).</div>
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Cheers,</div>
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--MBH</div>
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Michael Habibhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03641371798541261487noreply@blogger.com121tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-51344633141038459462014-04-14T10:32:00.000+01:002014-04-14T10:32:11.088+01:00Additional pterosaurs of the AMNH<br />
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You may be aware that there is currently a major new pterosaur exhibition opening at the American Museum of Natural History, entitled <a href="http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/current-exhibitions/pterosaurs-flight-in-the-age-of-dinosaurs">Pterosaurs: flight in the age of the dinosaurs</a>. In addition to <a href="http://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2012/03/27/pterosaurs-of-the-amnh-pt-1-solnhofen/">their existing collection</a> going on show, a number of key specimens have been borrowed from China and Brazil in particular and there is new art, animations and life models of specimens.<br />
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<br />Somewhat inevitably the Pterosaur.net crew are involved in at least some ways. I know that Mark has had an input on the reconstructions, and that Mike has talked to them about take off and flight. I've also heard that both terrestrial stalking an azhdarchids (from Mark and Darren) and floating posture (my recent work with Don Henderson) also get a look in as part of the displays, so even very new research is in there.<br />
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Here we are blessed with a few photos from the exhibit courtesy of reader Steve Cohen who is a volunteer there. Steve has generously taken photos before from the museum and passed them on, and here are a few more for the collection. Featured are <i>Wukongopterus, Tapejara, Thalassodromeus</i> and some other wonderful Brazilian and U.S. specimens, and I know material from the Solnhofen (including the dark wing, outside of Germany for the first time), pterosaurs tracks and even the first described egg are also on show. At least a couple of pterosaur researchers are planning a visit given the diversity of material and I hope to join the pilgrimage to see some of this stuff in the flesh. My thanks to Steve for taking the time to take these and send them on.<br />
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<br />Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-66999043595915475512014-03-20T19:55:00.000+00:002014-03-20T19:55:02.003+00:00A young intermediate pterosaur from Germany<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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A paper has just today been published describing this lovely specimen of what is rather obviously a) a juvenile pterosaur and b) something that is an intermediate between basal and derived pterosaurs. I've got some more photos and <a href="http://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2014/03/20/a-new-german-darwinopterid-pterosaur/">written up a brief bit here on it</a>.Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-88959200515654791922014-03-13T00:01:00.003+00:002014-03-13T00:02:24.327+00:00Quad launching birds and relevance for pterosaursMy recent G+ post has relevance to understanding pterosaurs. You can point your cursors <a href="https://plus.google.com/+MichaelHabib/posts/bhaJNwDzKMy">here</a>.<br />
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Bottom line is that quadrupedal launch is more common than it is typically given credit for. In fact, in terms of evolutionary origins, it has been more prevalent through time than bipedal launch.</div>
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Michael Habibhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03641371798541261487noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-75780932127104863722014-02-04T19:15:00.000+00:002014-02-04T19:15:45.779+00:00Cataloging the Carnegie
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pterodactyloid specimen with the impression of a throat pouch preserved</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">The number of
pterosaur specimens now known from the Solnhofen is very impressive, certainly
in the hundreds, although with a good number sitting in private hands, plenty
of information is kinda known about, without necessarily being in the
literature. However, while it is easy to bemoan the inaccessibility of material
that isn’t in museums, far too much that is available is not always looked at,
and a great case in point is the collection of Solnhofen material in the
Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh. In the early 1900s, the Carnegie was able to
acquire a large collection of fossils from a Belgian collector the Baron de
Bayet, and this included considerable amounts of Solnhofen fossils including a dozen
pterosaurs. This is arguably the best collection outside of Europe, or even
outside or Germany, and includes material in 3D, with soft tissues, stomach
contents and other rather nice details. However, in the following hundred years
a total of just 10 papers even mention these specimens, and some of these are
very much references in passing. The only even vaguely detailed mentions come
from Peter Wellnhofer’s works from the 1970s, which are not easy to access
these days, often available only with poor images, don’t illustrate all the
specimens, and came in many cases prior to additional preparation or other
modifications. In short, this is a major collection of pterosaurs which needs
to be revisited.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">While visiting Mike
Habib in Pittsburgh, we were hunting for things to do and realised this was an
area ripe for reappraisal and set to revising and updating the material.
Joining forces with Carnegie curator Matt Lamanna, we have now published a long
paper (appropriately enough in the Annals of Carnegie Museum) detailing the
material and its history. Naturally we have not done detailed descriptions of
the anatomy of the pterosaurs at hand – there are very good descriptions
of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>things like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus</i> and adding to that would
merely fill space without really conveying much useful information, so instead
we focused on what is unique about each specimen (taphonomy, condition of the
material, what is and isn’t present) and specific history of the material in
places. For completeness, we even briefly covered the casts in the collection,
and the skeletal models made by Wellnhofer when he was in the museum on a
sabbatical many years ago. This still resulted in a manuscript of over 15 000
words (despite there being only a handful of references) and 15 figures (at least
one of each specimen), while Mike rather heroically took dozens of measurements
for each specimen and then repeated the exercise for accuracy. The paper is in
black and white, but <a href="http://figshare.com/articles/Supplementary_and_additional_files_of_Carnegie_pterosaurs_/780794">colour versions of the key figures are online here alongside the data</a>. </span><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"></span></div>
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<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Some of these
specimens turned out to be much more interesting and potentially important than
previously realised and we were also able to correct some previous problems and
update the taxonomy. Recent revisions especially to the pterodactyloids has
left a lot of collections lagging in their taxonomy, but there was also a large
animal that was listed as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus</i>,
despite obviously being a pterodactyloid, and indeed actually doesn’t even bear
much resemblance to any currently known Solnhofen pterosaur and is rather
cryptic. Two specimens had been mistakenly thought to be a plate and
counterplate and had been combined even though they were quite different. After
much head scratching we realised the issue was that there was a plate and
counterplate there, but thanks to effectively a typo, the wrong pair had been
put together.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rhamphorhynchus specimen prepared free of the matrix</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Two specimens of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus</i> have undergone pretty
dramatic changes in recent years, having been fully prepared free of their
matrix. In one case, this results in a very odd flat specimen (which is
apparently now very fragile – I actually didn’t see either of these, they were
away when I was at the Carnegie) but that is at least cleaned up, but the other
is a near complete skull preserved in 3D. Many readers will remember the paper
on pterosaur neuroanatomy led by Larry Witmer that compared the brain
structures of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Anhanguera</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus </i>and this specimen was
responsible for the data on the latter. Three dimensional material from the
Solnhofen is not common, so a skull that is in 3D and prepared to the point
that it can be seen in all views is a real treasure and while it has been
scanned, we’ve included a series of large photos of it to help reveal the
structure.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1ahmoImoSGS-QmN-cttP8zRd4iB3py5w4NaGyVQvXNhyz21V3C_galdZ4ZvVp0YTUBe0NM7CUDO3PwSj6tsh0F70FUrziQyFxTlGHNqfbFJALeDhhR8o3PXBbYxUBUpbat9RAoSbRPFY/s1600/Fig+9+600.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1ahmoImoSGS-QmN-cttP8zRd4iB3py5w4NaGyVQvXNhyz21V3C_galdZ4ZvVp0YTUBe0NM7CUDO3PwSj6tsh0F70FUrziQyFxTlGHNqfbFJALeDhhR8o3PXBbYxUBUpbat9RAoSbRPFY/s1600/Fig+9+600.jpg" height="320" width="274" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rhamphorhynchus skull in near 3D (if lacking teeth) prepared free of the matrix</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Several specimens show
traces of soft tissues including the wings, throat sacs and tail vanes. None
are especially well preserved, but nor ore these features that common either
(in part perhaps because like the leg feathers of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Archaeopteryx</i>, they may have been destroyed in the past to ‘better’
prepare specimens), so any additional information is useful. Finally, one of
them does appear to have some fish teeth associated with the stomach. We this
is has been missed before by other people and so is a novel find, and that
extends the set of<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Rhamphorhynchus</i>
specimens with fish gut contents and firms up the evidence for piscivory as a
major part of the diet of these animals.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">Hopefully therefore
this paper will clarify a few issues with the collection, bring forwards some
of the developments and details not previously seen or recognised and provides
a basis for future research. Also of course it marks the beginning of the sad
death of Matt Lamanna’s career as a researcher of dinosaurs and the slow and
painful descent into working on pterosaurs and consorting with the kinds of
people who actually quite like them. For this Mike and I can only apologise, or
cackle wildly with unabandonned joy, depending on who is reading at the time.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Cambria;">Hone,
D.W.E., Habib, M.B. & Lamanna, M.C. 2013. An annotated and illustrated
catalogue of Solnhofen (Upper Jurassic, Germany) pterosaur specimens at
Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Annals of Carnegie Museum, 82: 165-191.<a href="https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnxkYXZpZGhvbmVzcmVzZWFyY2hwcm9maWxlfGd4OjQyNzljMDExMGRmZDc4NTU">Link to PDF here.</a></span><span style="mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;"></span></div>
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-58927890142214686772014-01-02T18:40:00.001+00:002014-01-02T18:42:09.622+00:00Pterosaur Aerodynamics at GWU<a class="g-profile" href="http://plus.google.com/103192696027278676547" target="_blank">+Lorena Barba</a> over at George Washington University had her students do some fun summaries of pterosaur aerodynamics at the end of the Fall Semester. She is a professor in engineering who runs a course on animal flight (she is also the CFD guru behind the latest analysis of gliding snakes with J. Socha). These topics followed from a discussion that Lorena and I had after some interesting (and amusing) trolling on my Google+ stream. We identified four topics for her students to look into more: pterosaur launch, pterosaur weight estimates, pterosaur wings and flight capabilities, and Wagner Effects. The students wrote blog posts, which can be found here:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-pterosaur-quad-launch/">http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-pterosaur-quad-launch/</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-pterosaur-weight-estimation/">http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-pterosaur-weight-estimation/</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-pterosaur-wings-and-flight-capabilities/">http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-pterosaur-wings-and-flight-capabilities/</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-the-wagner-effect/">http://lorenabarba.com/blog/student-guest-blog-post-the-wagner-effect/</a><br />
<br />
These students are all engineers, which adds a fun element because most were quite unfamiliar with pterosaur biology going into this project. There are some errors in the terminology and details of biology as a result, but it's quite good work, and brought some new things to light for me (especially the Wagner section). Enjoy!<br />
<br />
Oh, and Happy New Year everyone...<br />
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<br />Michael Habibhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03641371798541261487noreply@blogger.com42tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-73964652964883055552013-12-27T17:31:00.000+00:002013-12-27T17:32:33.974+00:00So this is Christmas, and what have you done?...<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">...asked John Lennon and Yoko Ono, in November 1972, before </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">most</span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> of the Pterosaur.net crew were even born.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This particular song is guaranteed to make me grind my teeth as I elbow my way through Aldi with a basket full of mince pies and a wet umbrella tucked under my arm. Yes, there's a bit of 'Bah Humbug' in me, I won't deny that, but that's not the whole reason. You will find other seasonal novelty songs on my iPod all year round, so why, I hear you ask, do I hate Happy Xmas (War is Over) with all my heart?</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's the opening lines really. So this is Christmas, and what have you done? Another year over, a new one just begun.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Groan. As if we need to be reminded that another year has shot by, and we haven't done half of the things that we wanted to. It's like being told off by your parents for dossing around in your pyjamas all day, instead of doing something useful.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But we haven't been dossing around in our pyjamas in the NHMUK pterosaur collection, contrary to any stories that you might have heard. It's been a busy year, as usual. I'd like to tell you how many collection visitors have been this year, but I don't have access to the stats right now, as I'm writing from the debris-strewn dining table at the Steel / Hume residence. Instead, let's go through the diary, and see what the NHMUK pterosaurs got up to in 2013.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The snout of the 'cookie-cutter' pterosaur <i>Istiodactylus</i> was CT scanned for a PhD project. At this stage I have no further information on what, if anything, this showed. The same project was to include SEM work on a single tooth. Several researchers are interested in this specimen, so I'm sure that this data will be useful to someone. Sadly, the student has decided not to continue with this project, making this the second time that a PhD project on <i>Istiodactylus</i> has stalled (if you'll pardon the pun). Perhaps it was cursed by the collector, Hooley, all those years ago.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Speaking of collectors, Heather Middleton kindly loaned her collection of Kimmeridge Clay pterosaur bones and teeth so that they could be photographed by those lovely chaps in the NHMUK photo studio. Some of Heather's specimens might feature in the pterosaur chapter of the forthcoming field guide to the Kimmeridge Clay (available in all good bookshops), which is edited by none other than Dangerous Dave Martill. He is also solely responsible for the pterosaur chapter, I believe. Heather's collection is far superior to the NHMUK material, and includes quite a few nice teeth.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The latest Isle of Wight pterosaur, <i>Vectidraco</i>, was described and named early this year. For those that missed it, the specimen is a small pelvis that was found by a young girl about two years ago, and donated to NHMUK by her. News reached the ears of 'The One Show', a popular tea-time television programme, and to cut a long story short, I had about 24 hours notice to prepare the specimen and myself for live TV on April 11th. The museum's Head of Conservation made a mount and a box so that the specimen could travel safely to the studio without being handled. Daisy, the girl who found the specimen, was there too, with her whole family, but was a bit overwhelmed by the whole live TV thing, and went all shy. I was too busy trying to hold my tummy in, and worrying that I would forget the name <i>Vectidraco</i>.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I didn't make it to the Pterosaur Symposium in Rio de Janeiro this year, as it wasn't as heavily subsidised as the one in Beijing in 2010. But several people were kind enough to send me copies of the abstracts volume. Much appreciated. I have a couple of spares, if anyone missed out.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One of the Solnhofen pterosaurs travelled to Southampton University for a session in their big CT scanner. Unfortunately this didn't go as well as hoped. The images showed bedding in the matrix, but no contrast between it and the bones. Later in the year, I was back at Southampton again for the Wealden symposium, which was very well-attended. Dave Martill spoke about <i>Istiodactylus</i>. And the Great Wall of China.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One of the last big events of the year was 'Blast From the Past' at Dinosaur Isle. This is an open day at the museum in Sandown, Isle of Wight, with local collectors, palaeontologists, archaeologists and artists all showing their work and collections to the many visitors. For me it was a chance to see old friends and hear about some recent finds. I was expecting to meet up with Nick Chase to pick up a couple of <i>Pholidosaurus</i> skulls that he'd collected in Dorset in the late 1980s, but to my surprise he also donated a few other specimens from the Island. These include a few bits of small pterosaurs, and a theropod humerus. I also saw Mick Green for the first time in ages, and he brought along most of his pterosaur collection.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Finally, a painted cast of <i>Dimorphodon</i> has been exchanged with AMNH (for some casts of Mongolian dinosaur bones) and a cast of the snout of <i>Istiodactylus</i> will probably be exchanged with Dinosaur Isle for a cast of their new small croc. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That's not all, of course. I won't bore you with all the croc-collection comings and goings, as presumably you came here to read about pterosaurs. So I will stop here, put on my pyjamas and watch my new DVD that I got for Christmas. It's called 'Flying Monsters' and it should be really good, because Sir David Attenborough is in it, and it has a blood-stained <i>Dimorphodon</i> on the front cover...</span><br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03259861618541576258noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-20692966563144140572013-10-23T09:42:00.000+01:002013-10-23T09:42:04.885+01:00Yes, it's from the Solnhofen. Really.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9HDKhMa0mIA1ncf2WDz8IWUqlLn5gWKVGNOsCoTg7mtBUjgDhUR9y-J5PKC8jySVnahNj4SO8FAwyy_8yTiLTS4TajE9SStnNYwlWYCppzEqdfy9KZH5mYfJwapqa1iPpj5zZOk0gOQg/s1600/IMG_7352.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9HDKhMa0mIA1ncf2WDz8IWUqlLn5gWKVGNOsCoTg7mtBUjgDhUR9y-J5PKC8jySVnahNj4SO8FAwyy_8yTiLTS4TajE9SStnNYwlWYCppzEqdfy9KZH5mYfJwapqa1iPpj5zZOk0gOQg/s400/IMG_7352.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
I'll just leave this here. Enjoy.Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-4006996148768241522013-10-20T20:53:00.000+01:002013-10-20T20:53:03.839+01:00Ornithocheirids on show<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Yes more photos from Frankfurt, this time of a combination display that has more or less everything. First off there's a superb mounted animal on the wing hanging from the ceiling. Then there is a cabinet containing a cast of a superb specimen on <i>Anhanguera </i>laid out in something I assume is close to the mid-point of preparation, and finally there is the whole prepared piece: the skull is separated and on show, and running up the side of the cabinet is the assembled wing.<br />
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Also there is a sectioned longbone, showing the wonderfully thin bone walls. This one is especially nice since it has, unusually, not been infilled with matrix making it really clear and the internal trebeculae are also quite clearly preserved (and apparently calcite crystal free).<br />
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It's quite a set and does show just how much information can be crammed into surprisingly little space and while I can't read the text of the main display it is clearly talking about burial, preservation, preparation and the reconstruction of the animal. Great stuff.<br />
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<br />Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-19034664000011685252013-10-19T20:52:00.002+01:002013-10-20T20:53:23.979+01:00Quetzy flying high<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
I've just returned from a very quick trip to Germany, dropping in at the Solnhofen Museum, Jura Museum Eichstaett and then onto Frankfurt in just 3 days. The primary purpose was actually looking at birds ad various feathered creatures but of course I took in more than a few pterosaurs too. There's a few more photos to come on that score including one extraordinarily important specimen that few will have seen and many will not even have heard of. In the meantime though, have a tanking great azhdarchid.<br />
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This one is beautifully mounted and is several meters off the ground in the main hall of the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt and all but soars about the dinosaurs. Rather nicely one can stand almost right under it as well as seeing it from near eye-level from the higher balconies of the galleries above. Plenty of museums now have a cast / sculpt like this of a giant azhdarchid / <i>Quetzalcoatlus</i>, but this is a nice one (if imperfect) and while this may sound odd, it's nice that it is so high up in the rafters, it still looks big from ground level, but it gives a better sense of scale when you get to its level and discover that it is clearly even larger than it looked from below.<br />
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<br />Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-59865215213079415312013-10-13T19:00:00.000+01:002013-10-13T19:00:00.934+01:00New pterosaurs, new phylogenies
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<span lang="EN-US">People with an interest in pterosaurs will
probably be aware of the recent passing of Wann Langston Jnr, the Texan
palaoentologist who was responsible for a lot of the popularizing of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Quetzalcoatlus</i>. I was lucky enough to meet
Wann at the 2007 Flugsaurier meeting in Munich where he was able to attend,
despite being well into his 80s. Wann’s work covered a great many aspects of
Mesozoic reptiles and the <a href="http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayIssue?jid=TRE&volumeId=103&seriesId=0&issueId=3-4">recent festschrift that has been published in his honour</a> covers a raft of different taxa.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Of interest to us though are three papers
on pterosaurs that between them name four new taxa! That’s quite an effort for
a single volume that is not even devoted to pterosaurs. However, what I want to
talk about here is the phylogeny that appears in the paper by Brian Andres and
Time Myers. Many will know that since 2003 pterosaur phylognies can broadly be
divided into two camps – those which look more like that of Dave Unwin’s 2003
paper (the one shown here in red and blue is from the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Darwinopetus
</i>description) and those which resemble Alex Kellner’s effort from the same
year (the one shown here is from the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Wukongopterus
</i>description). They are not actually <b>that</b> different from each other,
both have the same general arrangement of taxa but with some difference.
Kellner-type phylognies have anurognathids before dimorphodonitds, Unwin the
reverse. Unwin-types have ornithocheiroids before the ctenocasmatids, Kellner
the reverse. Both have the rhamphorhynchines immediately before <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Darwinopterus</i> and kin and those coming
before the origin of pterodactyloids and both have dsungaripterids close to the
azhdarchoids. In short, there’s a way to go to get a consensus and there are
some fairly clear and consistent contradictions, but they are not so far apart.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"> </span><span lang="EN-US">Interestingly, back in 2007, Brian Andres
presented on some of his PhD work where he talked about how the two might be
coming together, and Dave Unwin have a similar talk in Beijing in 2010.
However, the phylogeny in this paper (below) is really rather different to both of those.
This is the latest version of Brian’s analysis which has already popped up in a
couple of papers, but frustratingly, the actual core of this (i.e. the actual
character list and coding) still isn’t published –owing to the interminable
delays on The Pterosauria book - so there’s no way at the moment to see what is
causing these shifts.</span>
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<span lang="EN-US">The contrasts are quite dramatic though. Neither
the dimorphodontids nor anurognathids are at the base (or close to it) of the
phylogeny, but instead it is the eudimorphodontids and the anurognathids are in
fact lying more derived than <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Darwinopterus</i>
and close to the pterodactyloids! The dsungaripterids are also now not sister
taxon to the azhdarhoids, but lying within the clade as sister taxon to the
thalassodromids and with the tapejarids as a basal clade to these plus the
azhdarchids+chaoyangopterids.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">In short, if anything, the phylogenies are
getting further apart. Now I would expect them to converge again sooner or
later: after all, there is only one correct solution. But as often lamented (and
in particular by Darren), pterosaur phylogenies are generally rather character
poor compared to many analyses of archosaur clades so there is much more to
come. That said, I think some of the problem comes from the continued practice
of doing analyses that cover the whole of the Pterosauria. Surely we are at the
point where the rhamphorhynchoids and pterodactyloids are well separated and
there’s no need to repeatedly include both in every analysis – it’s probably
not helping the resolution of some trees where large chunks of the characters
or states needed to help resolve one clade won’t add anything to the other. Devoting
more time to better characters for smaller groups will probably be more
productive than continuing to code up large numbers of taxa where large numbers
of characters are inappropriate.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Anyway, that’s my 2p on the problem. Certainly
the current conflicts are interesting and I look forwards to seeing what
characters are supporting some of these unorthodox positions – there are likely
to be some interesting convergences and codings in there. Obviously it’s hard
to say much without the underlying data, but at face value I’m not overly
convinced by some of those positions, but it will be especially interesting to
see what these new positions mean for things like character support of branches
and if it calibrates better temporally than the other current competing ideas.
Now, we just need the book to get finished….</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Andres, B. & Myers, T.S. 2013. Lone
Star Pterosaurs. Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh</span><span lang="EN-US"><span lang="EN-US"></span>. 103: Issue 3-4, p 383-398.</span></div>
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-29104237917232217052013-09-03T20:57:00.001+01:002013-09-03T20:57:26.329+01:00SVPCA 2013 - a pterosaur spectacular<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Well SVPCA (Symposium for Vertebrate Palaeontology and Comparative Anatomy) for 2013 has just ended in Edinburgh. As per usual, there was a good set of pterosaur-related talks and the P.net crew was heavily involved. Mark spoke about azhdarchid neck evolution, I had a talk (which included Mike Habib as an author) on a new Rhamphorhynchus specimen with new evidence on their diets and Darren spoke on sexual selection in the fossil record which naturally included pterosaurs (and which included me as an author). Not bad at all really, but then there was the fact that for the first time since way back in Munich 2007, nearly the entire P.net crew was together!<br />
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As can be seen here we have (L-R), Luis Rey, Mark Witton, Darren Naish, Lorna Steel, me, Mike Habib (over from LA), Ross Elgin and John Conway. We were only short of Dino Frey and Helmut Tischlinger, and as neither rarely leaves the confines of southern Germany. I don't think we've ever had this many people together - even Dino didn't make the Munich conference that ultimately spawned the website, and certainly when the idea formed about the site we weren't all together so this might be the biggest set of us ever. Ah fun times (as rather demonstrated by the second photo below).<br />
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Anyway, while on the subject of groups of people talking pterosaurs in the UK, the announcement was formally made that the next 'Flugsaurier' meeting will be in 2015 and hosted at Portsmouth. Dave Martill will be leading the charge, with myself, mark, Dave Unwin and others helping. The plan is to link this (in terms of time) to SVPCA that year (which does not yet have a venue) so that Flug will go immediately before or after and so that hopefully a few people who have come to the UK for the pterosaurs may stay for the other meeting (or vice versa) and both conferences may benefit. SVPCA is usually in early September and so while we do not yet have a definitive date for Flugsaurier, expect it to be the end of summer 2015 with a date between the last week of August and third week of September. Fieldtrips are planned to both the Jurassic Coast and classic localities for things like <i>Dimorphodon</i> as well as to the Isle of Wight for <i>Istiodactylus</i>. Keep your diaries free!<br />
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-24789892320851424092013-08-24T17:45:00.002+01:002013-08-24T20:21:39.679+01:00Pterosaur origins and the ‘protopterosaur’One very interesting aspect of <a href="http://pterosaur-net.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/pterosaurs-natural-history-evolution.html">Mark’s new book</a> is his take on the pterosaur ancestry issue. From decades people have reproduced an illustration by pterosaur researcher Rupert Wild that presented a hypothetical pterosaur ancestor. It was something rather lizard-like (since he considered pterosaurs closer to the prolacertiforms than current mainstream thinking of them as sister-taxon to the dinosauromorphs) but with elongating fingers and the beginnings of wing membranes. While often commented on that this probably wasn’t a great model anymore, it was pretty much the only nice illustration out there and so kept being re-used, and it did at least provide a conceptual idea of just what such an animal might look like. Lacking any transitional forms for pterosaurs, we do have to imagine a bit, and as I’ve long said, this is one area where palaeoart is key as it can communicate ideas like this to a lay audience in a way no amount of even florid prose can realistically do.<br />
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Mark’s approach however was not to produce a single transitional form but several of them. He worked his way through something very close to an archosaur so something nearly a pterosaur over three distinct stages. That gives a much more thorough take on this issue and allows him to explore not just what these things may have looked like, but also the evolutionary pressures and problems at different stages of their evolution. What’s interesting for me is that it also contrasts and compliments with something that I’ve been working on.<br />
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Most of you are probably aware that some years ago a major academic book was promised on the pterosaurs. The damn thing seems to be on near-permanent hiatus (I wrote my chapters back in 2008) but as part of the introduction I did on pterosaur origins I got together with<a href="http://pterosaur-net.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/pterosaurs-natural-history-evolution.html"> Luis Rey</a> and produced an updated ‘protopterosaur’ to take into account both the ornithodires, but also new data and hypotheses on wing evolution, basal pterosaurs and other issues. Luis has been kind enough to let me put up his effort and Mark has also passed on one of his intermediates for comparison (obviously these are copyright to these respective artists).<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE3soQ5oj1WkC4It3GvYdxlfb1t9kQ0PLPLatgwpu6iLghdWAMWb7C40NzpW6ZPZ4wu9HLGEakvNhAKCdI4fjwOvuJP-GK4gPl8L0vECt_VDs1fS_9pREa-574jz4I_awJlxaJzIDiCzQ/s1600/Old+vs.+New+-+Witton+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE3soQ5oj1WkC4It3GvYdxlfb1t9kQ0PLPLatgwpu6iLghdWAMWb7C40NzpW6ZPZ4wu9HLGEakvNhAKCdI4fjwOvuJP-GK4gPl8L0vECt_VDs1fS_9pREa-574jz4I_awJlxaJzIDiCzQ/s400/Old+vs.+New+-+Witton+2013.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Marks' version of Rupert Wild's 'protopterosaur' (left) and his own suggested animal (right)</td></tr>
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While obviously the art style is very different and we’ve got one image to covers everything (whereas Mark was working in stages) there are some strong similarities in places. The area of pterosaur origins came up in a chat between us perhaps two years ago and we soon discovered we’d both been producing protopterosaurs and that we’d independently struck on some strong connections. Sure this is all hypothetical, but it is interesting that we’ve headed down some similar lines in places starting from the same point and with the same assumptions.<br />
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For completeness and as a general guide, here’s the figure caption I produced for Luis’ art. I would have normally gone for a darker colour and less bright pattern to emphasise this as a small animal, vulnerable to predators, but when you ask Luis to illustrate and animal “not bold colours” should never be in your description. Still, the other bits of anatomy I wanted and the details are all in there and reflect various issues of pterosaur origins:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrXv_Ge_pagIunMeFxDFifoNPlArRaxDbMe_f_dTwNW2aACFumB9NtntXcQAWpk8pihzXkE55HaxJvW9nfVMof8kzdm0dCt_uJhQaLKSr3Y1M8G8xdpQYhe2sDF_9Icl30yNYLdbnQg8Q/s1600/David%2527s+Ptero+AF.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrXv_Ge_pagIunMeFxDFifoNPlArRaxDbMe_f_dTwNW2aACFumB9NtntXcQAWpk8pihzXkE55HaxJvW9nfVMof8kzdm0dCt_uJhQaLKSr3Y1M8G8xdpQYhe2sDF_9Icl30yNYLdbnQg8Q/s400/David%2527s+Ptero+AF.jpg" width="280" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Luis Rey's version</td></tr>
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Note that this is not being presented as a scientific hypothesis but is used to illustrate some of the profound changes that must have occurred to the ancestral species to become a pterosaur. This image was created in partial tribute to the oft reproduced ‘protopterosaur’ image by Wild (1984) which imagined a transitional form between prolacertiforms and pterosaurs. For this piece the ancestor was considered to be a dinosauromorph and with anurognathids or dimorphodontids as basal pterosaurs. The animal also includes new information on pterosaurs evolution (e.g. Bennett, 2008 on the origin of wing folding) to illustrate how some parts may have evolved. Different parts of this animal have been ‘allowed’ to evolve at different rate and thus some are much closer to the ornithodiran condition, and others to the pterosaur condition. Note the following features: the animal is arboreal; an archosauromorph-like head which is relatively short and tall, with and antorbital fenstra and archosaurian teeth; enlarged pterosaur-like orbit; head, neck, trunk and hind-limb proportions close to that of <i>Scleromochlus</i>; a relatively short and flexible tail exhibiting only a small tail-vane that is similar in shape to juvenile <i>Rhamphorhynchus</i>; an elongated wrist, but with no pteroid or propatagium; large manual digits 1-3 with large claws, a straight an elongate fourth finger that is still shorter than that of pterosaurs, this retains a small, anteriorly directed ungual; absent fifth finger; a relatively broad-chorded brachiopatagium that reaches only to the knee, but which is replete with actinofibrils; a simple archosaurian pes with an unmodified fifth toe and no webbing between the toes; a very limited uropatagium covering only parts of the legs and integrating with the base of the tail; only limited coverage of pycnofibers with much of the body still covered by scales.<br />
<br />Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-57427392882752524392013-07-12T18:31:00.004+01:002013-07-12T18:31:47.725+01:00More on Rhamphorhynchus biologyOver on his blog, <a href="http://markwitton-com.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/rhamphomummies-and-zombie-skim-feeders.html">Mark has put up a post</a> about a recent popular science article on <i>Rhamphorhynchus </i>and in particular stuff on feeding and foraging behaviours. It's well worth a read and shows off a nice privately held specimen (that's mummified!) and discusses the undying issue of skim feeding. That's one of those ideas that just doesn't seem to go away no matter how hard it gets hit and Mark dissects the problem once again.<br />
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On a related note, the article Mark mentions was produced by Fred Weber for a French magazine. Mark did the art for it and similalry I borrowed to Witton materials for a piece I did with Fred on pterosaur ecology. It's in French (I wrote, he translated) but it does include some nice photos and art and can be <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/davidhonesresearchprofile/home/outreach-science-communication">downloaded from my site here</a> if anyone is interested (scroll down). <br />
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-27459300214519115432013-06-27T15:03:00.001+01:002013-06-27T15:03:47.007+01:00Pterosaurs: Natural History, Evolution, Anatomy – a review
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<span lang="EN-US">Right, let’s get the obvious bit out the
way first. I’ve known Mark Witton for more than 5 years now and while we’ve
never published a paper together, have certainly worked together, reviewed each
other’s papers at times, and spent much time talking pterosaurs and of course
doing things like Pterosaur.net. In short, he is both friend and colleague, and
some people reading this review may not know that. However, I do also do my
best to be fair and this is as honest a review as I feel I can produce. Added
to that, while I’ve known this was in production for a long time, I can’t
recall more than a couple of very minor conversations with Mark about the book
– I really knew very little about what he had done, how and why, before I saw
it, so I was coming to the book from a pretty unbiased standpoint in that sense
at least. </span>
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<span lang="EN-US">Anyone familiar with pterosaurs will know
that, kids books aside, there have barely been a handful of pterosaur books,
well, ever. We have Seeley’s 1901 effort that is still fascinating for the
professional, but just a wee bit dated. Wellnhofer’s 1991 Encyclopedia is a
classic but again has faded a bit in recent years with so many new forms coming
out and much more research, though it’s still a ‘must have’ for any serious
pterosaur researcher or enthusiast. In 2004 David Unwin had his Pterosaurs of
Deep Time which was a major update from Wellnhofer, but very different in style
to that one consisting of a lot more text and relatively few figures, though
lots of photos of key specimens. There has also recently been Andre Veldmeijer’s
one (illustrated by Mark as it happens) which is (so I understand, I have only
the Dutch and not the English version) relatively non-technical and aimed at a
more general audience. So right off, Mark’s tome joins a pretty sparse
collection, and any serious contribution is therefore going to be most welcome
to this band.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">In overall appearance it’s almost an exact
fit between Wellnhofer and Unwin – with a great deal of text and detailed
information, but not at the expense of numerous figures, both artworks (i.e.
life restorations and palaeoart) and diagrams and more technical illustrations
(graphs and skeletons) in addition to a good number of photos, though this is
one area where it is a little short. Where Wellnhofer was organised primarily
by time period, and Unwin by body parts or ecology / behaviour, the majority of
Mark’s book is taxonomic, with a (nicely colour coded) chapter for each clade.
It’s well put together, has a nice font (I’m not any kind of font geek, but it
is annoying when something looks inelegant on the page) and is on high quality
paper, the printing seems good too and the reproductions of the artworks and
figures are good.</span>
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<span lang="EN-US">I’ll do the criticism bit first and get it
out the way as there’s not much to criticise. In addition to the relatively
limited number of photos, the introductory and concluding parts of the book are
relatively short, and so while the main bulk is well done, there is a feeling
that the overall picture of pterosaur evolution and the wider context of them
in the Mesozoic is not given much space. It was also odd that there were no
‘further reading’ bits or a list of websites – one hopes that this book will
inspire more people to read up about pterosaurs and while I obviously hope
P.net will be a source for that, given the real problems pterosaurs do have
online (there’s some really major and problematic sites out there) something
that would help guide people to the good stuff would have been a useful
addition. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">My one real criticism would be that it’s a
bit of a mix of styles and while Mark’s writing is generally breezy and very
readable (and with little sarcastic comments, fun asides and generally friendly
tone) but there are quite a few technical terms that get thrown at the reader
from time to time that’ll have people reaching for a dictionary. That’s not
necessarily a bad thing – I like being challenged, but I’m sure a few general
readers will struggle at the first go to follow a few points and the odd
paragraph without going to the bookshelf (or more likely, google, some of that
anatomical stuff won’t be in your typical paper edition). It does mean though
that in places it feel a bit odd with a very readable style littered with words
you have to look up - a short glossary would certainly have been a help.
Overall it’s not a huge issue though and again, given word limits and the (I
assume) intended broad appeal of newbies through to real experts, there is a
very difficult balance to strike here and it’s not going to stop people reading
it or getting what they want from it. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">To be fair though, one cannot cram
everything about everything into a book of a limited word length, and so these
comments are perhaps more of an observation of the route taken rather than an
actual problem that could necessarily have been addressed while keeping the
rest of the book the same. To add anything at this word length other stuff
would have course have to go, and I’m sensitive that authors have their own
intentions (and have to bow to the publishers) and the constraints of the
formats. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Right, with that out the way, let’s get
onto the good. It is well written, and should appeal and be educational to
those who know little to nothing about pterosaurs, as well as being a generally
excellent summary of all things pterosaurian for experts. I found a few nuggets
in there I didn’t know about or had long forgotten and the layout of the book
is very easy to navigate as a reference piece. It is also accurate and about as
up to date as it can be and while already there are new taxa and papers that
affect things (such is life) this really will stand for a good few years to
come as pretty close to cutting edge. Certainly this is the first book to include
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Darwinopterus</i> and kin and to bring
forwards some of the more recent developments and advances in our understanding
of pterosaur biology. At the end of the book Mark argues something parallel to
my own paper on the ‘<a href="http://pterosaur-net.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/papers-via-blogposts.html">pterosaur renaissance</a>’ – pterosaur research is
accelerating in complexity and detail and this book really helps trumpet that
and bring it forwards.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">The controversial issues are handled really
well. Pterosaur research has some major splits within its ranks over some
serious issues (origins and phylogeny especially) and Mark is careful to point
out where things are contentious and what the alternates are, and why he (or
the community) comes done on one side or another. However, he also deals with
this pretty efficiently and avoids getting bogged down in details or the
endless arguments that afflict some coverage of this kind of stuff. He’s also
pretty clear as to what is already in the literature and which ideas are
supported by what evidence (the book is superbly well referenced throughout) and
when something is new and his own (i.e. this is the first appearance of an idea
in the literature) he also makes that clear. Some of these are things various
people have been knocking around for a while and if you’ve spoken to
researchers or seen discussions online they will be well familiar, but it’s
good to see them in print as more formal ideas and some of the evidence that
may support them laid out.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">The little reviews of each clade are very
useful, and each section is broken down into sections on anatomy, locomotion
and ecology, with key specimens of details illustrated and a map of the
locations of major fossils. Each clade comes with a full skeletal
reconstruction and a full life reconstruction alongside, so it’s very easy to
get an idea of how each group differed and their diagnostic features and
lifestyles. Some of the chapters are very short indeed, but it does make them
easy to read and follow and with the subheadings it’s also easy to pick out key
data – I think I’ll have an easier time dipping into this to re-read key points
or check things that I would with any of the other previous pterosaur entries.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Although I have said I’d have liked to have
seen some more photos, the book is very well illustrated. In addition to the
skeletals and basic life reconstructions, most chapters have a full-page image
or even two of pterosaur palaeoart. Although Mark regularly posts stuff on his
blog, almost all the art in the book is new, so there’s no extensive recycling
or anything like that. While hardly in ‘<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/lost-worlds/2013/mar/24/dinosaurs-fossils">All Yesterdays</a>’ territory, there are
plenty of images of pterosaurs doing things not normally illustrated and
interesting and new approaches to things like colour patterns and layouts of
the images – there’s no memes here to be had. The technical figures are even
better and are very well done with some nice stylistic flourishes in the
phylogenies especially, but overall being very clear and really conveying the
key points.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">So, summing up. Whatever the intent of the
author, the book does succeed at a number of levels. While probably a tricky
read for those very unfamiliar with fossils, it should be easily accessible for
anyone with a passing interest in palaeo as well as providing a solid review of
the whole of the Pterosauria that’ll be genuinely useful for researchers for
many years. I’m sure I’ll be typing “Witton, (2013) stated….” quite a lot in
the future and that, if anything, should be a good measure of how I rate this as
a scientific text. <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pterosaurs-Natural-History-Evolution-Anatomy/dp/0691150613/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1372341727&sr=1-1">Now go buy a copy and read it</a>, it really is very good. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Mark P. Witton, 2013. Pterosaurs: Natural History, Evolution, Anatomy. Princeton University Press. 291pp.</span></div>
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-19970748755814037262013-04-25T14:23:00.000+01:002013-04-25T23:50:24.453+01:00Pterosaur books to know and love, part 3: Pterosaur Trouble<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Covers/2139_cv3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Covers/2139_cv3.jpg" width="310" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>cover image, by D. Loxton and Jim W. W. Smith, courtesy of <a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Covers/2139_cv3.jpg" target="_blank">Kids Can Press</a>.</td></tr>
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What's this? A review of a children's story book on <i>Pterosaur.Net</i>? Isn't this site about pterosaur science, with specimen numbers, refutable hypotheses and that sort of thing? Relax, dear reader: this review <i>is</i> about pterosaur science, and specifically how it can be presented well to even very young audiences without dumbing down, compromising illustration quality or making up nonsensical stories about the past.<br />
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<i>Pterosaur Trouble</i>, penned and illustrated by Daniel Loxton, with some illustrative assistance from Jim W. W. Smith, is a recently published work of 'palaeofiction' aimed at 4-7 year olds. It's the second in the Kids Can Press 'Tales of Prehistoric Life' series, following the 2011 <i>Ankylosaur Attack</i>. The short story sees a 10 m span <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>halting its long journey across Late Cretaceous Canada in search of food, but runs into a vicious pack of <i>Saurornitholestes </i>instead. Along the way, we see various other fauna expected in a story set in the latest Cretaceous North America, including a couple of tyrannosaurs and a herd of <i>Triceratops</i>. As may be expected for a book aimed squarely at young children, the pages are kept largely free of text and only a single page, a final 'information page' on <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>and <i>Saurornitholestes</i>, has a significant amount of text. The story is thus mostly told through its illustrations, which is what we'll focus on first.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>spread, featuring <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>and some noisy dinosaurs, by D. Loxton and Jim W. W. Smith, courtesy of <a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Spreads/PterosaurTrouble_2139_spr2.jpg" target="_blank">Kids Can Press</a>.</td></tr>
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<b>Virtual reality</b><br />
The illustrations of <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>are entirely rendered through CG animal models composited into photographed backgrounds (Loxton speaks at length about his illustration process in an interview over at the <a href="http://www.csicop.org/specialarticles/show/getting_into_pterosaur_trouble_an_interview_with_daniel_loxton" target="_blank">CSI blog</a>). This sort of illustration has become commonplace in children's books on prehistoric life, and, it must be said, has generated some pretty awful<i> </i>bits of art. Sadly, there's probably more bad bits of CG palaeoart around than good ones, and this may create low expectations for <i>Pterosaur Trouble</i>'s illustrations. Happily, <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>dodges the problems of obviously photoshopped backgrounds and plastic-looking, poorly composited creatures to create images which look pretty convincing (as you can see for yourself with the spreads throughout this blog). I'm not sure that they're 100% photorealistic, which is clearly the effect being sought, but they're pretty durned near. And not in that creepy, <i>Polar Express </i>sort of way, either. I think my 7 year old self would be pretty convinced that I was looking at some photographs. Special mention should go to the little details embedded into some scenes. Feathers float through the air from attacking <i>Saurornitholestes</i>, water splashes reveal the trajectories of the animals making them and reflections are seen in still water.<br />
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A chief issue with many pieces of CG palaeoart is inaccurate portrayal of the animals themselves. <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>largely avoids this problem too, suggesting the mind of <a href="http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/tetrapod-zoology/" target="_blank">Darren Naish</a>, who's listed as the scientific consultant for the book, has been put to good use. The animals look, more or less, pretty good and can be identified as the species they're meant to represent. The basic proportions and appearances of the animals are fairly close to the mark, and I get the feeling that real effort was made to render animals which would satisfy fully fledged palaeontologists as much as children. Again, there are lots of little details to appreciate. The <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>beak has a chipped and rough appearance reminiscent of the <a href="http://thumbs.dreamstime.com/thumblarge_557/1290018691gbsMZ2.jpg" target="_blank">beak of a marabou stork</a>, the back of its neck has relatively long pycnofibres (as indicated by some specimens of <i>Pterodactylus</i> - see Frey and Martill 1998) and the primary feathers of the <i>Sauronitholestes </i>forelimb seem to attach to digit II (on correctly orientated hands, no less). The poses of the animals are also well chosen. There's a much appreciated deficit of roaring and <a href="http://markwitton-com.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/the-mysterious-mysteries-of-feather.html" target="_blank">hyperdynamic postures</a>, and the points of view are sensibly placed so that we can clearly see the action, but the animals never look strange and distorted.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>spread, showing <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>in some Top Gun valley action, by D. Loxton and Jim W. W. Smith, courtesy of <a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Spreads/PterosaurTrouble_2139_spr3.jpg" target="_blank">Kids Can Press</a>.</td></tr>
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As may be expected, I do have a few niggles. The faces and anterior neck regions of the star animals are devoid of fluff, a trope which I wish would politely clear off. Well known fossils of both dromaeosaurs and pterosaurs show that their necks and faces bore filamentous integuments, and we should reflect this in our reconstructions (Sharov 1971; Xu et al. 1999). The <i>Saurornitholestes </i>forelimbs could do with some more feather groups, and both star animals show some slight shrink wrapping on their heads. The uropatagium of the pterosaur attaches to the tail, which has never been found in any pterosaur specimen despite its prevalence in artistic reconstructions, and eye of the <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>is set way too high in the skull (see my <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>sp. skull reconstruction, below). Perhaps most glaringly, the wing finger of the pterosaur does not fold up against the body when the animal is grounded. These, and a few other nitpicks didn't really irk me that much however, probably because the overall illustration quality is pretty good and I enjoyed the other components of the book.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0J2JLWwM64y-9Bf3OgESTEwWNf4CYSCTy0HuehUEB13ROiv7nJSxBW9t9N6CyvOlbFdjUU4cnMaBwa9zKvELAxEutr3JEUAa8xtrn_L6OLQokXWAoQzQzB1F3IpjXrLJqAAyyBgrTxP8/s1600/Witton+Quetzalcoatlus+skull.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="118" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0J2JLWwM64y-9Bf3OgESTEwWNf4CYSCTy0HuehUEB13ROiv7nJSxBW9t9N6CyvOlbFdjUU4cnMaBwa9zKvELAxEutr3JEUAa8xtrn_L6OLQokXWAoQzQzB1F3IpjXrLJqAAyyBgrTxP8/s400/Witton+Quetzalcoatlus+skull.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Skull reconstruction of <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>sp., based on Kellner and Langston (1996). Note the ventrally displaced orbit, well below the top half of the skull. From Witton (2013).</td></tr>
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<b>Text me</b><br />
The images of <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>are embellished with short passages of text on each page which provide details on the accompanying image. The text scores highly for avoiding anthropomorphising its animals too much, a major pitfall of much 'palaeofiction' . Instead, we have the actions of the animals being described more than their emotional states, often with neat bits of information sneaked into the same sentences. For instance, <i>Quetzalocatlus </i>is described as 'a giraffe-sized giant landing as a gently as a dragonfly' at one point. In one sentence we're given a sense of the size, mass and flight capabilities of this animal, and all in concise and evocative language that a 4 year-old could understand. The text is pretty on the ball scientifically, too. Pycnofibres, pterosaur 'fuzz', are described as 'hairlike fibers' rather than feathers or fur. The azhdarchid is said to eat 'anything that walked or slithered', which sounds like a reference to the terrestrial stalking hypothesis of Witton and Naish (2008) to me, and the animal vocalisations are the clicks, coos and chatters of an avian-like syrinx rather than the snarls, roars and bellows of a mammalian larynx. Given that many children's books on prehistoric life simply rehash information from other, sometimes much older children's books on the same topic, or else make mistaken claims that simply aren't true, it's refreshing to see <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>presenting these new ideas to young audiences.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Spreads/PterosaurTrouble_2139_spr1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Spreads/PterosaurTrouble_2139_spr1.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>spread, showing <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>apparently approaching Isla Nublar, by D. Loxton and Jim W. W. Smith, courtesy of <a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/Assets/Books/w_PterosaurTrouble_2139/Spreads/PterosaurTrouble_2139_spr1.jpg" target="_blank">Kids Can Press</a>.</td></tr>
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The story itself has one foot in the science camp, too. The overall premise was inspired by a <i>Saurornitholestes </i>tooth left in a large azhdarchid tibiotarsus, an indication that this dinosaur once ingested pterosaur meat (Currie and Jacobsen 1995). Whether the dromaeosaur actually attacked and killed the azhdarchid in that case is debatable, and I do agree with Currie and Jacobsen (1995) that the body size difference between the dinosaur and pterosaur suggests scavenging activities rather than predation. However, we're all aware that remarkable and unexpected feats of predation can occur in modern animals, such as lions attacking <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2ZW0EvMzSM" target="_blank">fully grown elephants</a> and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFh73jNJguA" target="_blank">adult giraffes</a>, so we can't rule out the occurrence of similar events in the Mesozoic. Happily, <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>acknowledges this ambiguity on its final page along with a host of other factoids on its star animals. (Anyone interested in the logistics of dromaeosaur predation on pterosaurs should check out <a href="http://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2012/03/05/more-on-dromaeosaurs-vs-azhdarchids/" target="_blank">this post and its comments</a> at Dave Hone's Archosaur Musings, which go into some detail on these issues.)<br />
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I couldn't feel like I've reviewed this book fairly without mentioning one particular part of its story, which may serve as an excellent case study as for how well put together this little book is. At one pivotal moment, the <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>has to escape its dinosaur attackers, leading to it <i>quad launching </i>into the air while <i>carrying a couple of dinosaurs</i>. How cool is that? This one moment in the story, and its accompanying spread, is an awesome hat-trick of splendidness. Firstly, it reaffirms that Loxton has really been paying attention to the cutting edge of pterosaur research. Pterosaur quad launch is still a fairly fresh idea that, as a fully fledged hypothesis, was proposed as recently as 2008 (Habib 2008). Secondly, it features a simply terrific (and convincing) reconstruction of an azhdarchid mid-launch (below), with dromaeosaurs being cast from the launching pterosaur like feathery rodeo cowboys. Thirdly, it completely disregards the idea of pterosaur as weak, flimsy fliers, showing its star animal breaking free of its attackers and taking off despite being weighed down with unintended passengers. This is yet another nod to new research which indicates that giant azhdarchid humeri were extremely strong, and capable of launching animals far in excess of their estimated body weights (Witton and Habib 2010). As someone with a direct hand in this research, it's great to see these ideas being picked up here. Finally, the fact that a children's book is featuring quad launch makes me feel very warm inside, as a generation of people can now grow up with quad-launch in mind whenever they think of pterosaur takeoff. Wait, that's four things, which is one more than a hat-trick, right? Whatever: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f27IqVo5-Oc" target="_blank">I don't do football</a>.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9hyZLWHvf9PKkUeCrxC6ykXsc8muFzYKhRF4TVO-39R4D5m7UBA1PWaYzKqtu9Mx30n9zqquYQmtH9UeX5pQkZ3hocDR2N1So9LXDWFlpcHkS_j-1ZyMe7xd6OLA9MA8HsU-1msSxtLc/s1600/PterosaurTrouble_2139_preview_Single+Page.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9hyZLWHvf9PKkUeCrxC6ykXsc8muFzYKhRF4TVO-39R4D5m7UBA1PWaYzKqtu9Mx30n9zqquYQmtH9UeX5pQkZ3hocDR2N1So9LXDWFlpcHkS_j-1ZyMe7xd6OLA9MA8HsU-1msSxtLc/s400/PterosaurTrouble_2139_preview_Single+Page.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>spread, showing <i>Quetzalcoatlus </i>quad launching into awesomeness while shaking off some feathery vermin. Image by D. Loxton and Jim W. W. Smith, provided by M. Cornell</td></tr>
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<b>So, in sum...</b><br />
While I can't claim any great expertise in children's books on prehistory, I've seen enough attempts to bring extinct species to popular audiences to know that <a href="http://pterosaur-net.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/what-despair-pterosaurs-and-david.html" target="_blank">I often find more things to dislike than praise</a>. Because it uses up to date science, high quality illustrations and some clever text, <i>Pterosaur Trouble </i>is a fantastic little book that should greatly please and educate any little pterosaurologists you may know. I'll go so far as to say that <i>Pterosaur Trouble</i> is a terrific example of how to make a popular book on prehistoric animals both exciting <i>and</i> scientifically sound, an accolade that is all the more remarkable when you consider that a part of its targeted demographic is still learning to read. As a final recommendation, I could see myself reading a copy of this to my own kids, should I ever have them, without any muttering or wry comments. And if it can please a bitter old thing like me, then it must be doing something right.<br />
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If you're after a copy of <i>Pterosaur Trouble</i>, check out the <a href="http://www.kidscanpress.com/us/product.aspx?productid=6027" target="_blank">Kids Can Press website</a>, or log onto <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pterosaur-Trouble-Tales-Prehistoric-Life/dp/1554536324" target="_blank">Amazon</a>. The first book in the series, <i>Ankylosaur Attack</i>, is being published again by Franklin Watts in August, 2013 under ISBN: 9781445119427.<br />
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References<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><span style="line-height: 24px; text-indent: -14.2pt;">Currie, P. J. and Jacobsen, A. R. 1995. An azhdarchid pterosaur eaten by a velociraptorine theropod. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 32, 922-925.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">Frey, E. and Martill, D. M. 1998.
Soft tissue preservation in a specimen of </span><i style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">Pterodactylus
<st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">kochi</st1:city></st1:place></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">
(Wagner) from the Upper Jurassic of Germany. </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">Neuhes Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlugen</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">, </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">210</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; text-indent: -14.2pt;">, 421-441.</span></li>
<li>Habib, M.B. 2008. Comparative evidence for quadrupedal launch in pterosaurs. Zitteliana, B28, 161-168.</li>
<li>Kellner, A. W. A. and Langston, W. Jr. 1996. Cranial remains of Quetzalcoatlus (Pterosauria, Azhdarchidae) from Late Cretaceous sediments of Big Bend National Park. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 16, 222-231.</li>
<li>Sharov, A. G. 1971. [New flying Mesozoic reptiles from Kazahstan and Kirgizija]. Transactions of the Paleontological Institute, Academy of Sciences, USSR, 130, 104-113. [In Russian]</li>
<li>Witton, M. P. 2013. Pterosaurs: Natural History, Evolution, Anatomy. Princeton University Press, 336 pp. In press.</li>
<li>Witton, M. P. and Habib, M. B. 2010. On the size and flight diversity of giant pterosaurs, the use of birds as pterosaur analogues and comments on pterosaur flightlessness. PLoS ONE, 5, e13982.</li>
<li>Witton, M. P. and Naish, D. 2008. A reappraisal of azhdarchid pterosaur functional morphology and paleoecology. PLoS ONE, 3, e2271.</li>
<li>Xu, X., Wang, X. L., and Wu, X. C. 1999. A dromaeosaurid dinosaur with a filamentous integument from the Yixian Formation of China. Nature, 401, 262-266.</li>
</ul>
Mark Wittonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02524696111911168322noreply@blogger.com161tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-73466485197130333242013-02-21T14:17:00.001+00:002013-02-21T14:17:09.394+00:00Can you identify this cast?<br />
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Some of you may know that I've been trying to track down all manner of 'missing' Solnhofen pterosaurs. All kinds of specimens have been sold off over the years and are in collections all over the world. Many of these are 'known' to curators and visitors, but they don't realise that the material has never been described in the literature and is not readily known to the scientific (or at least pterosaur) community. If any of you do know of pterosaurs languishing in collections that have not been described, do please let me know in the comments.<br />
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The flip-side of this, is that things turn up that need to be identified. The other day Matthew Parkes, a curator in Dublin, e-mailed with with this photo. It's a plaster cast of a pterodactyloid pterosaur from the Solnhofen and labeled as being <i>Pterodactylus longicollum</i> (which has only just got a new generic name of <i>Ardeadactylus</i>). This seemes reasonable, the unusually long and tube-like cervical centra of this taxon are visible at the upper left part of this cast and the size and gross proportions are about right (even if few details are visible). However, Matthew wanted to know what original specimen this could be a cast *of* and that's where I'm stuck. I've seen most <i>Ardedactylus</i> specimens and don't recognise it, and I've checked through my extensive collection of photos and papers of all manner of Solnhofen material and can't find a match.<br />
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The records in Dublin show that it has been in their catalogue since 1891, so it's at least this old and probably rather older. The catalogue suggest it may be figured as a plate in von Meyer's 1854 Neues Jarbuch paper, but I don't have, and can't find, a copy. Matthew suspects it may be a lost specimen and in which case, this may be the only remainder. Of course if we can work out which it pertains to, we can check at the original institute, but the first step eludes us. So, anyone recognise it? Has it been spotted in Frankfurt or Haarlem? Or is there a figure in some obscure Wellnhofer paper I've missed?<br />
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Any help is welcome, and I'm still on the lookout for other Solnhofen pterosaurs, so please let me know of any you've spotted. Thanks and good hunting.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh8qCgPXVEyAaUb4YguXicIMxBCPnbc4yJX6xMz1pRiObPP7KEMjpdgmHQ0tk5zB1fElCaE6iyXzaUWOX6e-QyWrlCHEI8M8O0WI9Mne3bZpWoPJBVcYVHlNOBQzgTQNTM9M6umfTGtt4/s1600/DSCF2077.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="321" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh8qCgPXVEyAaUb4YguXicIMxBCPnbc4yJX6xMz1pRiObPP7KEMjpdgmHQ0tk5zB1fElCaE6iyXzaUWOX6e-QyWrlCHEI8M8O0WI9Mne3bZpWoPJBVcYVHlNOBQzgTQNTM9M6umfTGtt4/s400/DSCF2077.JPG" width="400" /></a><br />
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<br />Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com53tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-29114155495433781312013-01-31T11:57:00.000+00:002013-01-31T11:57:06.527+00:00A new Romanian azhdarchid in PLOS ONE<i>Posted on behalf of Darren:</i><br />
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A new azhdarchid pterosaur – a member of that highly
distinctive, long-necked, long-skulled Cretaceous clade most famous for the
gigantic <i>Quetzalcoatlus northropi</i> – has just been described by Mátyás
Vremir (Transylvanian Museum Society at Cluj-Napoca), Alex Kellner (Museu
Nacional in Rio de Janeiro), Darren Naish and Gareth Dyke (both of the
University of Southampton). The new animal is from the Upper Cretaceous Sebeş
Formation of the Transylvanian Basin in Romania and is named <i>Eurazhdarcho
langendorfensis</i> (Vremir <i>et al</i>. 2013). Based on a partial neck and
partial right wing found in close association (and hence definitely coming from
the same individual), it can be recognised as a new species thanks to various
details of its cervical vertebrae. </div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtWFgdrU9ZgG62BDz6LcotdsVn15Ji7BYzFO-bjH5sxXtx4CjICBAA9qp0TQoDwEHifEW5ULOqCaDpvHJHuqlHFr0kLAkCONr2goqg4hgc9hAWBcie6d2UAZgY6zo-FWbXAuJlzF9ROBU/s1600/Eurazhdarcho-langendorfensis-skeletal-reconstruction-Mark-Witton-350-px-Jan-2013-Darren-Naish-Tetrapod-Zoology.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="221" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtWFgdrU9ZgG62BDz6LcotdsVn15Ji7BYzFO-bjH5sxXtx4CjICBAA9qp0TQoDwEHifEW5ULOqCaDpvHJHuqlHFr0kLAkCONr2goqg4hgc9hAWBcie6d2UAZgY6zo-FWbXAuJlzF9ROBU/s320/Eurazhdarcho-langendorfensis-skeletal-reconstruction-Mark-Witton-350-px-Jan-2013-Darren-Naish-Tetrapod-Zoology.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
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Speculative reconstruction of <i>Eurazhdarcho langendorfensis</i> </div>
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(in quad launching pose), by Mark Witton.</div>
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Scale bar = 500 mm. From Vremir et
al. (2013).</div>
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<i>Eurazhdarcho </i>was a small azhdarchid, with an
estimated wingspan of about 3 m. As discussed in the paper – <a href="http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/tetrapod-zoology/2013/01/30/new-azhdarchid-pterosaur-eurazhdarcho/">and also at theTetrapod Zoology article on the new species</a> – <i>Eurazhdarcho</i> is
yet another azhdarchid discovered in a terrestrial, continental sort of
environment: it provides more support for the view of azhdarchid behaviour and
ecology that Mark Witton and I put forward in 2008 (Witton & Naish 2008).
What’s also interesting is that <i>Eurazhdarcho</i> seemingly lived alongside a
gigantic species (probably <i>Hatzegopteryx thambema</i>) that would have had a
wingspan of 10-11 m. What does this mean for azhdarchid ecology? Does it show
that different azhdarchid species were sharing habitats and occupying distinct
ecological niches? These issues and more are covered at Tetrapod Zoology and also in the paper. The paper is in <i>PLOS ONE</i> so is
freely available to anyone (linked below).</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsQmWfztt-xkfekEvhTrridt4z_qoV2LzIguZ-wr0-IkA-_VICNdiAg7PRPhcrslzViB7GFShHmj1KY_896XIB6t1QfpBMzgUEB6DJOixQcplsLuZcC7Ug0fY9SW0nARx2gA8caIuWIcA/s1600/Vremir-et-al-2013-Eurazhdarcho-Mark-Witton-map-600-px-Jan-2013-Darren-Naish-Tetrapod-Zoology.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsQmWfztt-xkfekEvhTrridt4z_qoV2LzIguZ-wr0-IkA-_VICNdiAg7PRPhcrslzViB7GFShHmj1KY_896XIB6t1QfpBMzgUEB6DJOixQcplsLuZcC7Ug0fY9SW0nARx2gA8caIuWIcA/s400/Vremir-et-al-2013-Eurazhdarcho-Mark-Witton-map-600-px-Jan-2013-Darren-Naish-Tetrapod-Zoology.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some geological units reveal evidence of two or even three
sympatric azhdarchid species. Diagram produced by Mark Witton and map used with
kind permission of Ron Blakey, Colorado Plateau Geosystems, Inc; from Vremir <i>et
al</i>. (2013).</td></tr>
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<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0054268">Vremir, M.,Kellner, A. W. A., Naish. D. & Dyke, G. J. 2013. A newazhdarchid pterosaur from the Late Cretaceous of the Transylvanian Basin,Romania: implications for azhdarchid diversity and distribution. PLoSONE 8(1): e54268. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0054268</a></div>
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<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0002271">
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<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0002271">Witton, M. P. & Naish, D. 2008. A reappraisal ofazhdarchid pterosaur functional morphology and paleoecology. PLoS ONE 3(5): e2271. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0002271</a></div>
Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-20472771926016782452013-01-27T10:04:00.001+00:002013-01-27T10:04:13.157+00:002012 Reach roundup for Pterosaur.net
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Well we're well into 2013 now, so time to do a quick summary of the team's contribution to pterosaur research over the last 12 months or so. As usual, there's a good selection of material here covering new species and finds, reviews and summaries, ecology and behaviour and evolutionary studies. I maintain its important in the light of, shall we say, 'competing' sites on pterosaurs, that we show our activity in the scientific literature and the fact that we present our work publicly and put it through peer review (and those who work on pterosaurs will be well aware just how brutal this field in particular can be when it comes to reviews).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">As this is a general sort of update post, I thought I'd put up a reminder that <a href="http://www.museunacional.ufrj.br/riopterosaur/registration.html">the 2013 Flugsaurier meeting in Rio</a> has extended the deadline till the 31st of Jan, so you still have another week to get in your abstracts.On a very different note, <a href="https://www.microryza.com/projects/cannibalism-in-giant-tyrannosaurs">I'm appealing for funds to support research into tyrannosaurs </a>(not very pterosaur-y, but very outreach related) so if you can spare a few bucks or just have the time to tweet and blog this, please spread the word.</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Habib M.</span></b><span style="mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"> in press.
Constraining the Air Giants: Limits on size in flying animals as an example of
constraint-based biomechanical theories of form. Biological
Theory: Special Volume (X): XXX-XXX</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Habib M. </span></b><span style="mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">2012. Mesozoic
speed demons: flight performance of anurognathid pterosaurs<br />
2012. ASB Annual Meeting, Gainesville</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hone, D.W.E.</b> 2012.
A new specimen of the pterosaur <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus.
Historical Biology</i>, 24: 581-585. (This has been online since 2010 but is
only now in print).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hone, D.W.E. </b>2012. Pterosaur
research: recent advances and a future revolution. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Acta Geologica Sinica</i>, 86: 1366-1376.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hone, D.W.E.</b>, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Naish, D.</b> & Cuthill, I.C. 2012.
Does mutual sexual selection explain the evolution of head crests in pterosaurs
and dinosaurs? <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lethaia</i>, 45: 139-156.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hone, D.W.E.</b>,
Tischlinger, H., Frey, E. & Röper, M. 2012. A new non-pterodactyloid
pterosaur from the Late Jurassic of Southern Germany. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">PLoS ONE</i>, 7: e39312, 18p.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hone, D.W.E.</b>,
Tsuhiji, T., Watabe, M. & Tsogbataar, K. 2012. Pterosaurs as a food source
for small dromaeosaurs. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Palaeogeography,
Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology</i>, 331: 27-30.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal" style="margin-bottom: .1pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: .1pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Hyder, E., <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Witton, M. P.</b> and
Martill, D. M. 2012. Evolution of the pterosaur pelvis. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Acta Palaeontologica Polonica</i>. [in press]</span></div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal" style="margin-bottom: .1pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: .1pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">Naish, D.,</span></b><span style="mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"> Simpson, M.,
& Dyke, G.J. 2012.<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> </b>A
small-bodied azhdarchoid pterosaur from the Isle of Wight (UK): its
implications for pterosaur phylogeny, anatomy, diversity and distribution. SVPCA
(Oxford).<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Knell, R., <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Naish, D.</b>,
Tompkins, J.L. & <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hone, D.W.E.</b> 2012.
Sexual selection in prehistoric animals: detection and implications. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Trends in Ecology and Evolution</i>, in
press. (Not directly pterosaurian, but they do get a big mention and it
includes an illustration by Mark too).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lü, J-C. &<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> Hone,
D.W.E. </b>2012.<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> </b>A new Chinese anurognathid
pterosaur and the evolution of pterosaurian tail lengths. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Acta Geologica Sinica</i>, 86: 1317-1325.</div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal" style="margin-bottom: .1pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: .1pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal" style="margin-bottom: .1pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: .1pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Martill, D. M., Sweetman, S. and <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Witton,
M. P.</b> 2012. Pterosaurs of the Wealden. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Palaeontological
Association Field Guide to Wealden fossils.</i></span></div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal" style="margin-bottom: .1pt; margin-left: 0cm; margin-right: 0cm; margin-top: .1pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Steel, L. </b>2012. The pterosaur collections at the Natural
History Museum, London, UK: an overview and list of specimens, with description
of recent curatorial developments.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Acta
Geologica Sinica</i>, 86: 1340-1355.</div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="yiv805590283msonormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Witton, M. P. </span></b><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">2012. New insights into the
skull of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Istiodactylus latidens</i>
(Ornithocheiroidea, Pterodactyloidea). PLoS ONE, 7, e33170.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-66596003724371582532013-01-02T15:35:00.006+00:002013-01-02T15:35:52.908+00:00Guest Post. Dragon Tails: What Pterosaurs Teach Us about Velociraptor<style>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As part of the flurry of new papers in the Flugsaurier 2012 paper pseudo-volume, Scott Persons has a paper out looking at the remarkable convergences between various dromaeosaurs and a number of rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs. Here in a guest piece he takes us over this project. - Dave.</span></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">An
Unexpected Tail</span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Last
week, like a growing 149 million dollars’ worth of<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6430035742565248013" name="_GoBack"></a> other holiday
movie goers, I took three hours out of my yuletide respite to make an epic trek
across sidewalks long and public transportation foul to my local cinema and saw
“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”. I was particularly keen to see how the
special effects wizards of Weta Workshop would depict the story’s big bad: Smaug,
the dragon. Naturally, since <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Hobbit</i>
has been broken up into a trilogy, Peter Jackson decided not to fully unveil Smaug,
and I’ll have to wait until the sequel. But there was a surprise appearance by
a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Megaloceros</i> (the “broad antlered”
or “Irish Elk”), and Jackson did give the audience a dragon teaser. We got to
see a smoke-obscured silhouette here, a clawed foot there, and . . . the tail.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’m
a PhD student of paleontology at the University of Alberta and, with the help
of my supervisor Dr. Phil Currie, I’ve dissected, excavated, measured,
photographed, and digitally sculpted the tails of many creatures, ancient and
modern. To me, Smaug has an interesting tail. Unlike a crocodile or a dragon
from the isle of Komodo, he did not drag his tail behind him. Rather, the Tolkienian
drake carried it raised above the ground -- a caudal posture that I suspect
shows the influence of dinosaur paleontology on the animators. The tail was very
flexible and muscular enough to casually toss aside a group of armored castle-defenders
and to do collateral damage to the medieval architecture.</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB3HzSqqCsMOPGD74JipnsrxgGu5wrW1HYYlrBBw0Hri7SNS2PabhbQAZszj4qQ3nF9mwsQpC5xEztXgBPxZv2vf_EiHiHVBRSmxaD0t4ao5R0M_6w2cic9n3kXtiKBCPtxavEP0gdLdY/s1600/ptail+image+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="148" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB3HzSqqCsMOPGD74JipnsrxgGu5wrW1HYYlrBBw0Hri7SNS2PabhbQAZszj4qQ3nF9mwsQpC5xEztXgBPxZv2vf_EiHiHVBRSmxaD0t4ao5R0M_6w2cic9n3kXtiKBCPtxavEP0gdLdY/s320/ptail+image+1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Swooping
out of the sky, Smaug’s fiery breath and wrecking-ball tail deal a one-two
punch to a stone tower.</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That
brings me to a fun, blatantly whimsical, and entirely inconsequential thought
problem: if the monsters of Middle-earth were not spontaneously generated from
Uruk-hai pits and human imaginations, but instead were products of biological evolution,
what sort of tail would a dragon most likely have? It’s a silly question, but at
least twice in the history of our own planet, reptilian beasts have taken on
dragon-like form, and both times their tails have followed remarkably
convergent evolutionary paths.</span>
<br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tail
of a Revolution</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
can be argued that, of all the dinosaurs ever dug, none have been more
scientifically important than <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>.
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i> is a kind of
dromaeosaurid (meaning that it belongs to a group of carnivorous dinosaurs
commonly known, because the group includes the iconic <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i>,<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </i>as
“raptors”). <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The 1969 study of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i> by Professor John Ostrom
documented a wealth of anatomical features previously unseen, or at least
unrecognized, in any other dinosaur. Many of these features seemed to imply a
high metabolic rate, an active lifestyle, and an ancestral relationship with
modern birds. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i> was the
catalyst that began the “dinosaur renaissance” or “dinosaur revolution” (a
paleontological paradigm shift that has affected how we think about, and
approach learning about, a great deal more of prehistory than just dinosaurs --
including pterosaurs). Among the unusual anatomy of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i> was its tail.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
skeleton of a tail is an extension of the spinal column and, in a dinosaur, the
tail skeleton is composed of three major kinds of bones. First and foremost,
are the interlocking vertebrae, which protect the spinal nerves and sport upwards-projecting
neural spines, to which epaxial muscles attach. Then, there are the caudal ribs
(or simply “transverse processes” – there is controversy over the proper
terminology), which fuse to the vertebrae and project outwards (perpendicular
to the long axis of the tail) and also provided anchorage for tail muscles.
Last, but certainly not least, are the chevrons. Despite the fact, or perhaps a
little bit because of the fact, that these tail bones have received little
descriptive or collecting priority from other researchers, I positively love
chevrons. They are elegantly shaped, usually resembling capital Y’s, are important
for tail muscle function, and (contrary to historic assumption) are useful in
identifying taxonomic and evolutionary relationships.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the tails of both dinosaurs and pterosaurs, chevrons are
positioned in between sequential pairs of vertebrae and project downwards.</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvOzqlMtD4zFykD3lOiPbmV80AOwM2i-rLcgnOUEhBmSyPh2vkRvAkVcokfHUDUwBn9oSqmComLXGTiTBie7JIewsV9F6N0XPL3ppSh6FoWfnAE1PO5qDyN5xlQdqk5lsujSKZaWj1cN8/s1600/ptail+image+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvOzqlMtD4zFykD3lOiPbmV80AOwM2i-rLcgnOUEhBmSyPh2vkRvAkVcokfHUDUwBn9oSqmComLXGTiTBie7JIewsV9F6N0XPL3ppSh6FoWfnAE1PO5qDyN5xlQdqk5lsujSKZaWj1cN8/s320/ptail+image+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
basic parts of the tail skeleton shown on a duckbilled dinosaur.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">At
the start, the tail skeleton of<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Deinonychus</i>
appears normal. Just past the hips, the neural spines, caudal ribs, and
chevrons all have a typical shape and they all project to a respectable extent.
But, as the tail progresses towards the tip (and it doesn’t take long) things
start to get weird. The neural spines, caudal ribs, and chevrons all shrink in,
with the former two disappearing entirely . . . and then come the caudal rods.
Both the vertebrae and chevrons abruptly develop pairs of elongated rods of
bone that project towards the hips. These rods are slender, but very long (the
longest easily overlap seven other sequential vertebrae), and they split, each becoming
two still thinner rods. Together, rods of the vertebrae form a quiver that
virtually encapsulates the dorsal (upper) portion of the tail, and together the
rods of the chevrons do the same to the ventral (lower) portion.</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_qMzjbCXrwn2623mSuV_9thvIrAI3sboKiDfyGfYm-bJEf0u5yZlqVX24ZGndX3lB4-yMuNmDUOss3gNuMqO68-85ROKiMvrA4yKhHdTzZgW2Psq2MP1fE2Nsv6cdHUuOUJYbEgWkw14/s1600/ptail+image+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="233" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_qMzjbCXrwn2623mSuV_9thvIrAI3sboKiDfyGfYm-bJEf0u5yZlqVX24ZGndX3lB4-yMuNmDUOss3gNuMqO68-85ROKiMvrA4yKhHdTzZgW2Psq2MP1fE2Nsv6cdHUuOUJYbEgWkw14/s320/ptail+image+3.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Raptor
tails are strange! Elongated vertebral rods form an upper quiver and elongated
chevron rods form a lower quiver. Skeletal image of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i> courtesy of Scott Hartman (www.skeletaldrawing.com</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> Professor
Ostrom was rightfully impressed by the caudal rods of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>, and he realized that such unusual structures must have
evolved to serve some sort of unusual function. Ostrom’s best specimens of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i> were preserved lying on
their sides and their tails were straight as boards. Ostrom was also much taken
with what he thought was the overall highly-athletic nature of the hindlimbs of
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>, so he speculated that
the caudal rods were adapted to aid in high-speed pursuit. His idea was that
the rods must have stiffened the tail and allowed it to function like the
balancing pole of a tightrope walker. This balancing tail, he reasoned, would
have come in handy when turning while running or when leaping onto the back of
some poor dinosaurian herbivore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Enter
the Sky Dragons</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
tail of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i> and its raptor
relatives is bizarre, but it is not (as Professor Ostrom himself realized)
unique. Among all known vertebrates, a similar tail anatomy has evolved in one other
group. . . and now we come to why I have been allowed to spend so much time
discussing dinosaurs on what is supposed to be a blog about pterosaurs. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">While
later and more advanced pterosaurs (like Pterodactylus) only had short, stubby
tails, early pterosaurs had long ones. The caudal skeletons of these
long-tailed pterosaurs (with the exceptions of the dimorphodontids and very
primitive forms) are strikingly similar to that of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>. In the case of long-tailed pterosaurs, the function of
the caudal rods has always seemed obvious. As flying animals, increased
rigidity would have helped a tail to serve as a stabilizer or as a rudder.</span></div>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEn2XcLRQ1FDUtpqakFrG6Xx86TkOIXW6Tdo1mtof4UczoAUnBsVi3qDKHoBCi8aQxfTFjqhLN707rCQtRSLu7FhDEJf6UaGpG7v4u8UUfzzUov4NTR9Q4vSB7XLqwxwyCTOv_yedLEhY/s1600/ptail+image+4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="237" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEn2XcLRQ1FDUtpqakFrG6Xx86TkOIXW6Tdo1mtof4UczoAUnBsVi3qDKHoBCi8aQxfTFjqhLN707rCQtRSLu7FhDEJf6UaGpG7v4u8UUfzzUov4NTR9Q4vSB7XLqwxwyCTOv_yedLEhY/s320/ptail+image+4.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Look
familiar?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The tails of pterosaurs
and dromaeosaurids are so similar that, in the fossil-forging black-markets of
China, the tail of one is often used to “complete” a partial skeleton of the other.
Skeletal image of </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Rhamphorhynchus</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">
courtesy of Scott Hartman (www.skeletaldrawing.com).</span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
Professor Ostrum’s description of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>,
he expressed his interest in considering this striking example of convergent
evolution in a later study. Regrettably, however, he never got around to it -- after
all, he soon had a revolution on his hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Fleshing
Out the Evidence</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span></b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
lot has changed since the dinosaur renaissance. For instance, we now know that
caudal rods are characteristics of all dromaeosaurids (except the South
American unenlagiine dromaeosaurids, which are odd-ducks in many regards). We
know a lot more about the evolutionary history of caudal rods, in both dromaeosaurids
and pterosaurs. We also know that the rods were not as stiff as Ostrom had
thought. Consider the below images of a tail of a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bambiraptor</i> and of a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i>.
Both are dromaeosaurids with caudal-rod bearing tails and both are fully
articulated. Yet, both are preserved in a sinuous curve (or in the case of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i>, many sinuous curves).</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmFMRhO50JWNJ3hfDla2KmKhCkUIkVBlED3-JglNWjmqkQOza6fY7aLf8MoHe092jkM5wc-4xMtT4ri6rzq9229yEM9EwSEWR8icAayXqZpync8m7EUS25A771S343eVOmtc9z-efx47M/s1600/ptail+image+5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmFMRhO50JWNJ3hfDla2KmKhCkUIkVBlED3-JglNWjmqkQOza6fY7aLf8MoHe092jkM5wc-4xMtT4ri6rzq9229yEM9EwSEWR8icAayXqZpync8m7EUS25A771S343eVOmtc9z-efx47M/s320/ptail+image+5.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
strongly curved tail of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bambiraptor.</i></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-no-proof: yes;"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSR7_rVi3B33Gvfgo4xxb5srZJw30kggQh9M5HeruPaTCZJhqJmqQzSN-O-3EhcmScVr0pvMeXqNqnC748y1Cy2Ve0kjcX8JQeYu5AsARTvL-V_RCd2I1W1L-4dUzNBEytRR8vt1kgZ2k/s1600/ptail+image+6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSR7_rVi3B33Gvfgo4xxb5srZJw30kggQh9M5HeruPaTCZJhqJmqQzSN-O-3EhcmScVr0pvMeXqNqnC748y1Cy2Ve0kjcX8JQeYu5AsARTvL-V_RCd2I1W1L-4dUzNBEytRR8vt1kgZ2k/s320/ptail+image+6.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Despite
its caudal rods, this <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor </i>tail
is preserved in a graceful S-shaped curve.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So,
it turns out that caudal rods are flexible (not surprising when you think about
how thin each rod was). But, if caudal rods permitted their tails to curve to
such a degree, what good were they? Well, I suspect that the rods were very
helpful in keeping the tails rigid. No, I am not talking in circles, and I
don’t think that I am talking nonsense. The rigidity provided by the rods of dromaeosaurids
was one-dimensional. I have been able to see a lot of dromaeosaurid tail
fossils, and many specimens, like the two above, are curved laterally, but I
have never seen one that shows articulated caudal rods bending strongly
dorsoventrally (that is, up or down). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>That
caudal rods provide mostly dorsoventral rigidity makes sense, if you consider
the way the rods are arranged in their quivers. The rods are not haphazardly
piled on top of one another; rather, they are tightly pressed against the
vertebrae and chevrons and are neatly stacked vertically. In other words, the
quivers were arranged to be thicker dorsoventrally than they were laterally. </span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRl3ihBvP0w_-LtyY2hKvAtlz5k3-Rww92Mfrs7lXJB8nrB5j1E5FXBIUno4E7y6gO8huH3Osf4Y5G7wwLCcgIr21z0k2ZMV8v7c7j-4EvXth_ckHv8d5KNlp2e31gF2w_daqNNW5v_UI/s1600/ptail+image+7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRl3ihBvP0w_-LtyY2hKvAtlz5k3-Rww92Mfrs7lXJB8nrB5j1E5FXBIUno4E7y6gO8huH3Osf4Y5G7wwLCcgIr21z0k2ZMV8v7c7j-4EvXth_ckHv8d5KNlp2e31gF2w_daqNNW5v_UI/s320/ptail+image+7.jpg" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Cross-section
through the tail of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>
showing the arrangement of the caudal rods. The arrangement of the rods made
the tail harder to bend up-and-down than side-to-side.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEcL21_YgIrImvYW9lPoOcIjibUIYIXyqNVlXOkDxxDdILeHvw3NbG4NEOis91fmB4XemWueH-bS1wfyUYZMGHmOkTw5eAd31cR8XbOwVJQAE8-ybf85owoppQ6X0s-uLMQGebNZZsIz8/s1600/ptail+image+8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEcL21_YgIrImvYW9lPoOcIjibUIYIXyqNVlXOkDxxDdILeHvw3NbG4NEOis91fmB4XemWueH-bS1wfyUYZMGHmOkTw5eAd31cR8XbOwVJQAE8-ybf85owoppQ6X0s-uLMQGebNZZsIz8/s320/ptail+image+8.jpg" width="254" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
cylindrical tight-rope walker’s pole is the wrong analogue. Instead think of a
meter stick, which may be bent with moderate force, but only perpendicular to
its broadest plane.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
is now also possible to think a step further and consider the muscles of the
tail. Let’s first try to do that in very general qualitative terms. Remember
the quickly reduced neural spines, caudal ribs, and chevrons? Those all
indicate that the caudal muscles of both dromaeosaurids and pterosaurs were
substantially reduced. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To
help consider the problem </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">quantitatively,
a technique I used was to create digital models of the tail skeleton of a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i> and a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus</i> (a pterosaur) and to sculpt the corresponding
muscles over the skeletal models. The results of this modeling concur with the
qualitative inference. In particular, raptors and pterosaurs were found</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">
to have very weak caudofemoral muscles (indeed, some pterosaurs may not have had
caudofemoral muscles at all). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCDPh-b6yH3L0ZucrfhF7KhyphenhyphenIYGj5267oZKr_NWwf9tMzXwvmUcWvGP0jv68Fe-vRTVASJNsihE4mXDGwX3T8LHV-awmB92NAcsB81xyB9-23eZSmkVZ7Y9M4WBHLhGWsl6vRp_5OFBN8/s1600/ptail+image+9.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCDPh-b6yH3L0ZucrfhF7KhyphenhyphenIYGj5267oZKr_NWwf9tMzXwvmUcWvGP0jv68Fe-vRTVASJNsihE4mXDGwX3T8LHV-awmB92NAcsB81xyB9-23eZSmkVZ7Y9M4WBHLhGWsl6vRp_5OFBN8/s320/ptail+image+9.jpg" width="259" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Digital
reconstructions of the tail of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i>,
showing the tail and hip skeleton (A), the caudofemoral muscles (B), and the
full muscle reconstruction (C).</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRiZ-O2XOiu9Ag4R0ZDkBSVPi4C7eOpyTZ6geIDifwNH1XJ0iv_0WnrHq3df0x8q8r41nSeHkxsv0kaWOQkBLCAANlNJBWAXf9q70VCWGQKTBuExaiw5HmBz4gPyZT-gsXcwsTWv7SIvI/s1600/ptail+image+10.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRiZ-O2XOiu9Ag4R0ZDkBSVPi4C7eOpyTZ6geIDifwNH1XJ0iv_0WnrHq3df0x8q8r41nSeHkxsv0kaWOQkBLCAANlNJBWAXf9q70VCWGQKTBuExaiw5HmBz4gPyZT-gsXcwsTWv7SIvI/s320/ptail+image+10.jpg" width="306" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Digital
reconstructions of the tail of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rhamphorhynchus</i>,
showing the tail and hip skeleton (A), the caudofemoral muscles (B), and the
full muscle reconstruction (C)</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">These
caudofemoral muscles merit special explanation. They are muscles found in the
tails of reptiles and dinosaurs that are actually part of the hind limb system.
They are the primary limb retractors and provide a major power boost when
walking and running.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Again,
these adaptations seem easy to explain in the tail of pterosaurs. If a tail is
to serve as an inflight rudder, some lateral flexibility would be needed, but
strong dorsoventral stiffness would have prevented the constant pull of gravity
from deflecting the tail downwards and disrupting the body’s aerodynamic form,
and all the better if this stiffness was obtained by the passive rigidity of
bone, rather than the hard work of muscle. Reducing weight is always a benefit
for flight, and, perhaps, particularly reducing posterior weight. What better
posterior weight could a flying animal lose than that of a tail muscle whose
primary function is in land-bound locomotion? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thanks
in large part to the work of pterosaur researcher Dr. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dalla Vecchia</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">,
we know that among the most primitive of pterosaurs (animals like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Austriadactylus</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Eudimorphodon</i>) caudal rods had not yet evolved (though there are some
anatomical signs that they were in the works). However, all these primitive forms
already had clear possession of the power of flight. We can be certain (or
about as certain as the fossil record ever permits) that, when the caudal rods
of pterosaurs evolved, it was in the context of an aerial lifestyle. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To
me the remarkable similarity in form between the tail skeletons and muscles of
pterosaurs and dromaeosaurids indicates an equally strong similarity in
function.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is it possible then,
that the tails of dromaeosaurids also evolved on the wing?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Feathered
Dragons from the Orient</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
little dromaeosaurid <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Microraptor</i> has
sparked something of its own dinosaur revolution. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Microraptor</i> is among the oldest and most primitive of the known
dromaeosaurids. Buried in fine volcanic ash, specimens from the famous fossil beds
of China have revealed that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Microraptor</i>
had feathered wings on the fore and (oddly enough) on the hind limbs. It also
had caudal rods. Whether or not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Microraptor</i>
could truly fly or simply glide is a matter of current scientific debate, but
the winged-raptor was clearly not a land-bound creature. </span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiD1Nxpwg70YcxEchE2wi3Iyz1955_o7b6o-V35TghMFQPaMv0v8iV0ESoTlVRdWvJCgQVU0UuVSZOXze3QwieSgTjiCaZQfv9UgWTPYk2gq32zo-VH4ucCjmXR3zCDIAPWsg8p1k2md98/s1600/ptail+image+11.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="174" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiD1Nxpwg70YcxEchE2wi3Iyz1955_o7b6o-V35TghMFQPaMv0v8iV0ESoTlVRdWvJCgQVU0UuVSZOXze3QwieSgTjiCaZQfv9UgWTPYk2gq32zo-VH4ucCjmXR3zCDIAPWsg8p1k2md98/s320/ptail+image+11.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-no-proof: yes;"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Microraptor</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> has wings and caudal
rods.</span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-no-proof: yes;"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span></div>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">An
older Chinese </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">dinosaur,
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Anchiornis</i> is</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> a
primitive member of the Deinonychosauria. Named in honor of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>, the group</span><span lang="EN-US"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Deinonychosauria includes the dromaeosaurid
and their close relatives the troodontids. Like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Microraptor</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Anchiornis</i>
had wings, but it lacked caudal rods. Thus, as with pterosaurs, it appears
possible to bracket the evolution of the bizarre dromaeosaurid tail between two
aerial genera.</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl0iJKMzWNr2HrOBHQoJKRXuuA615DUMfps-BChoGcLCrniy5xPltZET7ivR8Trm_5v-YqQifSwbFca2PhZp73sK4JbRGCPJgBLibdkqbqUDkEcA42YMLJcaE808CtYUwLPst1RDT58fU/s1600/ptail+image+12.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl0iJKMzWNr2HrOBHQoJKRXuuA615DUMfps-BChoGcLCrniy5xPltZET7ivR8Trm_5v-YqQifSwbFca2PhZp73sK4JbRGCPJgBLibdkqbqUDkEcA42YMLJcaE808CtYUwLPst1RDT58fU/s320/ptail+image+12.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anchiornis</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> has wings but not caudal rods.</span></td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Does
all this mean that the tails of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>
and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i> indicate that these
dinosaurs could fly? Certainty not. However, I do think it means that we should
think of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deinonychus</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Velociraptor</i>, and other dromaeosaurids
like Cretaceous ostriches. They are animals without the ability to fly or glide
but who have inherited a few telltale anatomical feature that attest to their
ancestor’s aerial life. (I am certainty not the first person to suggest this.
Based on various other lines of anatomical evidence, many paleontologist, most prominently
Greg Paul, have argued that dromaeosaurids were secondarily flightless.) </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
also think it means that, when you imagine a flying dragon, be it a dinosaur,
pterosaur, or thought problem fantasy, you should not envision it with a tail
that limply streams behind it. The tail should be, most probably, held up; be
capable of lateral, but not vertical, swishes; be muscularly reduced and light
weight; be quite elegant and graceful; and, thus, not (I am afraid, Mr.
Jackson) be of much use as a siege weapon.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuu0S7eWbiQbcNj9-I0qO-KZPs1wU-s-OqSmrYaFSspbE_iRNh8hDMgh2h2jIJs5YCZrw0wkKCFjfK1l1fP-dDuntlS0DTRRE-Ak0RtE52qGSvorEKd2Ymio8g_Q58x7N2x0kw7ZwVFVc/s1600/ptail+image+13.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuu0S7eWbiQbcNj9-I0qO-KZPs1wU-s-OqSmrYaFSspbE_iRNh8hDMgh2h2jIJs5YCZrw0wkKCFjfK1l1fP-dDuntlS0DTRRE-Ak0RtE52qGSvorEKd2Ymio8g_Q58x7N2x0kw7ZwVFVc/s320/ptail+image+13.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-5135644615993636402012-12-30T17:11:00.002+00:002012-12-30T17:11:42.859+00:00Papers via blogposts
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Those keeping up with the pterosaurian literature will be
aware that the latest issue of Acta Geologica Sinica has a set of papers
resulting (at least in part) from the 2010 Beijing Flugsaurier meeting. (And
while we’re on the subject, <a href="http://www.museunacional.ufrj.br/riopterosaur/registration.html">the 2013 meeting in Rio </a>has extended abstract
submissions till the 31<sup>st</sup> of January, so there’s still time to get
them in). I’ve got a couple in there and while people might be more interested
in the horribly flattened anuroganthid, I’m more keen to talk about the short
review paper I produced.</div>
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The title, ‘Pterosaur Research: Recent Advances and a Future
Revolution’, might sound familiar and indeed some of the content may too.
That’s because it ultimately sprung out of a post that I had over on the
Musings and <a href="http://pterosaur-net.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/pterosaur-revolution.html">also put up on Pterosaur.net</a>. This is a first for me at least, a
paper that resulted pretty much directly from a blogpost.</div>
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At the time I’d been writing about rates of discovery of
dinosaurs and pterosaurs and what that might mean for future discoveries. It
occurred to me that actually the pterosaurs seemed to be going through
something of a renaissance in the way that dinosaurs had in the 1970s. We were
finding more and more of them, more papers were being published by more
researchers, and more of the big questions were either being answered, or at
least were being tackled in a rather more systematic way than they had before.
It occurred to me that this was worth summarising and producing something more
formal. The fact that the next Flugsaurier volume was due meant there was a
most suitable venue available and discussions with various colleagues helped me
develop the idea and push for it’s inclusion.</div>
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If you look back at the developments of the last 10 years or
so in pterosaurs, it’s quite a remarkable and rapid progression. That’s not to
overlook the huge amount of groundwork that had gone before and the efforts of
previous generations, but even quite a few fundamentals that had occurred for
dinosaurs decades ago are now being sorted out for pterosaurs. We now have
inclusive phylogenies for pterosaurs, we’ve got a good idea of their soft
tissue structures and especially the wing, some of the taxonomic and systematics
issues of the past are being resolved, we’ve got a major transition in the form
of <i>Darwinopterus</i>, cool new taxa like the boreopterids and chaoyangopterids turning up, detailed
analyses of flight, take-off, mass estimates, muscle patterns, and skull
shapes, we finally, finally, have eggs and we’re even getting serious on
behaviour and ecology for analyses of head crests, growth and the like as well
as looking at major evolutionary trends like diversification and distribution.
We’re even getting attention from the public and serious attention with whole
exhibits on pterosaurs, new books, and documentaries, and of course we now have
the Flugsaurier meetings themselves, established and (hopefully) regular events
that will help keep things ticking along. </div>
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So this paper attempts to summarise all of this and in
effect provide a statement of the ‘state of the art’ – what do we know and how
have we got there, but it is also supposed to be a bit of a celebration of the
last decade of research and the gains made by the pterosaur research community.
Those in the know will probably realise that the background to this has not
been without a significant amount of strife, and while this is not mentioned in
the paper, I think it only emphasises how much has been learned despite this
limitation. I hope it also provides a sort of counter-point, but also a
continuation of Peter Wellnhofer’s piece that kicked off <a href="http://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2008/12/08/flugsaurier-pterosaur-papers-in-honour-of-peter-wellnhofer/">the 2008 Flugsauriervolume</a>. Peter wrote a review of the history of pterosaur research, but pretty
much only took it up to the modern era, and with the galloping developments of
the last few years, this should bring things more or less up to date.</div>
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<a href="http://www.geojournals.cn/dzxbcn/ch/reader/view_abstract.aspx?file_no=201206005&flag=1"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Hone, D.W.E.</span></span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> </span></b><span style="font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Pterosaur research: recent advances and a future revolution. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Acta Geologica Sinica</i>, 86: 1366-1376.</span></a></div>
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The paper is available here (and indeed all of the latest
papers are from AGS). Just click on the left hand set of the three series of
Chinese characters at the bottom of the page and then add a .pdf suffix to the
filename once it’s been saved. </div>
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Dave Honehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15154020254590603978noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-5465031142134251612012-12-12T01:09:00.001+00:002012-12-12T01:12:59.422+00:00LACM to Boston: G+ Hangout InterviewI recently did a G+ hangout interview with Lorena Barba's bio-aerial motion class out at Boston University. I broadcasted from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, along with Justin Hall. Here's the link on YouTube: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Mt88TkOlD4g">https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Mt88TkOlD4g</a><br />
<br />
This was our first go with the "On Air" feature, which automatically records the hangout and sends it to a personal YouTube channel. I talked a lot about pterosaurs, as well as a bit about <i>Microraptor</i>.<br />
<br />
Cheers,<br />
<br />
--MH<br />
<br />
<br />Michael Habibhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03641371798541261487noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-23980294362146798292012-12-01T02:17:00.003+00:002012-12-01T02:17:57.868+00:00That pesky clearance problemI have received quite a few questions over the last year or two about wing clearance during takeoff in pterosaurs. This seems to be a sticking point for some, as evidenced by the problem rearing it's ugly head again with the recent Chatterjee et al. GSA conference spectacular (see earlier posts below). It would seem prudent to lay out some of the issues surrounding this problem - or, more specifically, to explain why this isn't really such a huge problem after all.<br />
<br />
Because of the way that flying animals scale, larger, long-winged species with greater flight speeds flap with <i>lower</i> amplitudes than smaller species (on average, that is). Interestingly enough, this means that the amount of clearance required by large flyers is comparatively small, so long as they can get up a good bit of speed on takeoff. To examine this issue more closely and quantitatively for giant pterosaurs, we can look at something call the Strouhal number.<br />
<br />
Strouhal Number is a dimensionless parameter that describes the "gait" of a flapping flyer (or really, anything that is oscillating its propulsion system in a fluid). As it turns out, because of vortex shedding efficiency constraints, animals are remarkably constrained with regards to their Str during cruising flight: it only varies <a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v425/n6959/full/nature02000.html">from about 0.2 to 0.4</a> including everything from insects to large birds. There is a great explanation of this number, and its application to flying animals, <a href="http://style.org/strouhalflight/">here</a> (I've shared that link elsewhere to good effect).<br />
<br />
Str for a flapping flyer can be calculated as the ratio of flapping amplitude to the product of frequency and velocity. The largest pterosaurs probably flapped at a rate just over 1 hertz in cruising flight, and likely had minimum steady state speeds near 12 m/s and a cruising speed a good bit greater, say around 20 m/s or more. <br />
<br />
Now, during launch, the animal probably only gets up near steady state stall speed (incidentally, it doesn't <i>have</i> to, contrary to what you often read in basic biology textbooks), and the Str can rise above the 0.4 mark that we might expect during cruising. Let's let the Str rise to 0.50 and constrain the launch velocity to the min steady state stall speed above. That still gives us an amplitude for the very tip of the wing in <i>Quetzalcoatlus</i> of 5.6 meters. Of that total arc, about 40% of it is upstroke, so that leaves a required glenoid height at the end of the launch phase of 3.4 meters or so. Given that <i>Quetzalcoatlus</i> had a glenoid height of about 2.5 meters while <i>standing</i>, it turns out that very little leaping is required at all for sufficient clearance (less than 1 meter). The animal still needs to jump, but nothing extraordinary is required.<br />
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<br />Michael Habibhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03641371798541261487noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-37048449730436922872012-11-24T14:54:00.000+00:002012-11-24T14:54:42.447+00:00GUEST POST: Felipe Pinheiro and the Raiders of the Lost Palate<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix6onOVN32EGnPrYRevL8uNUJWv9IRqcEJDP9Y_ZlolE-lnfHZvI9JfnKSLlnpIEDvKKsxis7qfMR_Wgjjaqfu7F0bCfdc4PxOQmRsMKCjHfYNCCBf0zDUy2sZxSKuhylYFRaQyKxxCxI/s1600/Figure+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix6onOVN32EGnPrYRevL8uNUJWv9IRqcEJDP9Y_ZlolE-lnfHZvI9JfnKSLlnpIEDvKKsxis7qfMR_Wgjjaqfu7F0bCfdc4PxOQmRsMKCjHfYNCCBf0zDUy2sZxSKuhylYFRaQyKxxCxI/s320/Figure+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;">2012 has been a good year for pterosaurs, with several new taxa and important papers being published. This trend continued this week with the description of a <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0050088" target="_blank">fragmentary but intriguing pterosaur palate</a> from the famous Cretaceous Santana Formation of Brazil, authored by Felipe Pinheiro and Cesar Schultz of the </span><span style="line-height: 14.133333206176758px;">Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul. Avenida Bento Gonçalves, Brazil, and </span><span style="line-height: 14.133333206176758px;">Bayerische Staatssammlung für Paläontologie und Geologie, Germany, respectively </span></span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">(image of the new material is shown above. Image courtesy Felipe Pinheiro)</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 14.133333206176758px;">. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">Felipe asked if we could big up the paper here at the Pterosaur.Net bog, but I'm a little too pushed for time to write a post worthy of the article, which not only describes the specimen but sheds much needed light into pterosaur palatal anatomy. Felipe was kind enough to provide his own illustrated summation of the story however, so we could still cover the paper here at the blog. On that note, I'll hand you over to our guest blogger, and be sure to check out his <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0050088" target="_blank">open access paper</a> for more details on this new discovery. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 18px;">MPW 24/11/12</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The fragility of pterosaur skeletons is always working against us, the paleontologists
devoted to understanding these flying archosaurs. Independently if our research
deals with systematics, anatomy or paleobiology, we’re often confronted with
the fact that our research subject is badly crushed and a great deal of useful
information is simply lost. A very good example of this issue is the pterosaur
palate: although new pterosaur taxa are being published all the time, only a
handful of well-known specimens have this structure preserved, thus, limiting
our knowledge of its anatomy and evolution within the group. Luckily, some rare
sedimentary deposits were kind enough and maintained the original,
three-dimensional shape of their fossils, allowing the study of otherwise
inaccessible anatomical features, like, of course, the pterosaur palates. <o:p></o:p></span></span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">(Pterosaur specimens showing palatal regions below. Image courtesy Felipe Pinheiro)</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEji5Mquc4M7drleITvnp7TTqLkbV3Ms_rFMzUTKK7MpYSeRWE3IFcS8na5j6Kihk5raRwJXdmrVCMa-guS5ZV2oo4PYSoYwQfe18CBJIgtEK3w_x7dqBCIaC2cc1SMABErF63XcgTWH2po/s1600/Figure+4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="207" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEji5Mquc4M7drleITvnp7TTqLkbV3Ms_rFMzUTKK7MpYSeRWE3IFcS8na5j6Kihk5raRwJXdmrVCMa-guS5ZV2oo4PYSoYwQfe18CBJIgtEK3w_x7dqBCIaC2cc1SMABErF63XcgTWH2po/s320/Figure+4.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Our understanding of pterosaur palatal anatomy changed considerably
after the recent work by Attila Ösi and colleagues (2010). Analyzing pterosaur
palates under an evolutionary perspective and utilizing the Extant Phylogenetic
Bracket as a tool, the authors identified homologue structures between
pterosaurs, birds and crocodiles, demonstrating some bones that were misinterpreted
throughout the literature. The best example is the conclusion that, in
pterosaurs, most of the palate is composed by palatal blades of the maxillae,
instead of the palatines. Although this identification was also proposed by
some old researchers, like Newton (1888) and Seeley (1901) and, more recently,
Peters (2000), common sense was still that the palatines composed most of
pterosaur palatal surface. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">As the work of Ösi <i>et al</i>.
(2010) was mainly focused on stem “non-pterodactyloids”, especially <i>Dorygnathus</i>, a new look on
pterodactyloid palate was still needed and this is the main subject of our new
paper, titled “An Unusual Pterosaur Specimen (Pterodactyloidea, ?Azhdarchoidea)
from the Early Cretaceous Romualdo Formation of Brazil, and the Evolution of
the Pterodactyloid Palate”. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Besides describing a new fragmentary (but interesting) palate from the
Romualdo Formation (the Early Cretaceous concretion-bearing strata of the
Santana Group, northeastern Brazil), we analyzed and redescribed a number of
well-known pterosaur specimens with palatal preservation, such as <i>“Pterodactylus” micronyx</i>, <i>Anhanguera </i>and<i> Pteranodon. </i>Also, the palate of the Iwaki <i>Tupuxuara</i> specimen is described and illustrated for the first time.
As a result, our work shows that pterodactyloids had often complex palatal morphologies
with, sometimes, interesting “reversions” to the non-pterodactyloid condition,
with three pairs of lateral openings. Also interesting is the extreme reduction
of elements in some taxa, such as the almost vestigial ectopterygoids of
anhanguerids. (Possible evolutionary pathways of the pterosaur palate shown below. </span></span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 18px;">Image courtesy Felipe Pinheiro.)</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 115%;"> </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFnkqUVoPjaYnGZ958ydwwiDTQ7woC2QvnaV3_Sv_e3RfCPgvbq8H6x5uwpU1a93TK4Ocm2I2QND4OEfszBl5Du0szQwn03NMuFmGr6i2IduexzMHRDLJaNksvToe4PgZ7bm9AJw6g1X8/s1600/Figure+5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="274" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFnkqUVoPjaYnGZ958ydwwiDTQ7woC2QvnaV3_Sv_e3RfCPgvbq8H6x5uwpU1a93TK4Ocm2I2QND4OEfszBl5Du0szQwn03NMuFmGr6i2IduexzMHRDLJaNksvToe4PgZ7bm9AJw6g1X8/s320/Figure+5.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">This morphological disparity is probably an evidence of complex feeding
habits among derived pterodactyloids, with ecological implications that is,
presently, the research subject of our working group, at the Universidade
Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;">I hope you all read <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0050088" target="_blank">our paper</a> (don’t worry, it’s open access). We’re
opened to all kind of criticism and discussions by my personal e-mail: </span><span lang="PT-BR"><a href="mailto:fl_pinheiro@yahoo.com.br"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;">fl_pinheiro@yahoo.com.br</span></a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;">.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Enjoy! <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="PT-BR" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Felipe L.
Pinheiro<o:p></o:p></i></span></span></div>
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<span lang="PT-BR" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Laboratório de
Paleontologia de Vertebrados, Instituto de Geociências, Universidade Federal do
Rio Grande do Sul.</i><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">References:<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Ösi A, Prondvai E, Frey E, Pohl B (2010) New interpretation of the
palate of </span><span style="line-height: 115%;">pterosaurs. The
Anat Rec 293: 243–258.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 115%;">Newton ET (1888). On the skull, brain and auditory organ of a new species
of Pterosaurian <i>Scaphognathus purdoni</i>), from the Upper Lias near Whitby,
Yorkshire. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci </span><span lang="PT-BR" style="line-height: 115%;">179: 503–537.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Peters D. (2000). A re-examination of four prolacertiforms with implications
for pterosaur phylogenies. Riv Italiana Paleontol Strat 106: 293–336.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Seeley HG (1901) Dragons of the Air: an account of extinct flying
reptiles. New York: Appleton & Co.; London: Methuen & Co.</span></span></li>
</ul>
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Mark Wittonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02524696111911168322noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6430035742565248013.post-30121170788325050742012-11-12T07:30:00.002+00:002012-11-12T07:32:35.411+00:00Pterosaur fact checkingI will keep this brief, since Mark already did a great job of responding to the media release from the recent Chatterjee et al. presentation. One thing to look for in any sort of functional morphology argument is whether the anatomy, the numbers, and the behavior all match up. One reason the Chatterjee et al. abstract is so immediately concerning is that their <i>own</i> information doesn't jive internally.<br />
<br />
Example 1: one of their concerns with the quad launch hypothesis is clearance for the wings after launch. Now, I've calculated the expected clearance and everything seems fine, but that doesn't mean I'm right. Maybe someone will find an error at some point. What is clearly <i>not</i> going to be true, however, is the idea that keeping the feet on the ground (biped running launch) is going to give <i>more</i> <i>clearance</i> than a leap. It simply isn't possible to get more clearance by not jumping (it might be true that jumping still isn't enough, but it's not going to be worse). So Chatterjee et al. have a mismatch between their own conclusions and their arguments with the competing model. The numbers and the behavior don't match up.<br />
<br />
Example 2: Chatterjee et al. argue that pterosaurs can't work as scaled up bats, and argue instead that they should work like scaled up birds. Anatomically, pterosaurs don't match <i>either</i> of these, so the bat argument is a straw man, and the bird argument is moot. The anatomy and the behavior don't match up.<br />
<br />
These are the sorts of arguments that raise red flags in scientific discourse. On a final note, there are some basic fact checking items that should be looked out for, such as claims about living animals. From the media story, Chatterjee is quoted as saying "Like albatrosses and the Great Kori bustards, which weigh 20 to 40 pounds, ground takeoff was agonizing and embarrassing for <i>Quetzalcoatlus</i>."<br />
<br />
Aside from the problem with the pterosaur analogy, there is the obvious problem that Kori bustards don't have trouble taking off (though they might find it embarrassing; I haven't asked them). In fact, Kori bustards can leap into flight at a steep angle. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBkmFYuDKUc">Check this out</a>. Yes, the bustard tries running to escape, first, but when pressed, it just leaps into the air. No big runway, no "agonizing" takeoff. In fact, there is no correlation between running launch and size in living birds or bats. More on that some other time, but in general, if a YouTube search quickly demonstrates that your commentary is flawed, that's a bit worrisome.<br />
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Michael Habibhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03641371798541261487noreply@blogger.com8