Studying fossils from a mass-mortality event reveals evidence for sexual dimorphism and, unusually, equal numbers of males and females in a herd of dinosaurs.
Consistent bimodal variations in the femoral morphology of various modern amniotes and a remarkably large herd of coeval fossil non-avian theropods evidences sexual dimorphism in dinosaurs.
A score-based read selection strategy enables the assembly of novel full-length ribosomal RNA sequences for mosquitoes, which improves the physical and computational removal of interfering ribosomal RNA reads in RNA-seq and provides another molecular marker for taxonomic and phylogenetic inquiries.
The hagfish slime glands, which produce a large volume of defensive slime within 0.4 s by ejecting threads and mucus into seawater, evolved from cells and genes expressed in the skin.
The eggshells of palaeognath birds (e.g. ostrich, moa, kiwi, emu) have diverse homology and convergent features, and are useful modern analogues for the evolution of non-avian dinosaur eggshells.
Computed tomography data reveal large and adult-looking inner ears in very young individuals of the long-necked dinosaur Europasaurus holgeri suggesting precociality in this dwarfed island dweller from the Late Jurassic of Germany.
Three-dimensional digital reconstruction shows the temporal and palatal regions of stemward avialans are evolutionarily and functionally conservative, and the mixture of plesiomorphic cranial morphologies together with derived postcranial skeleton manifests the key role of mosaicism in early bird diversification.
Paul C Sereno, Nathan Myhrvold ... Lauren L Conroy
A digital flesh model of the sail-backed dinosaur Spinosaurus was tested and performed very poorly in water, favoring the view of this dinosaur as a two-legged, wading ambush predator of large fish in shallow waterways and not an aquatic dinosaur.
Andrea S Meseguer, Alice Michel ... Fabien L Condamine
Neotropical outstanding biodiversity emerged from sustained rates of species accumulation over time, although, for some periods, tetrapods were less successful than plants in keeping pace with a changing environment.
