Portal:Paleontology

The Palaeontology Portal

Introduction

Paleontology (/ˌpeɪliɒnˈtɒlədʒi, ˌpæli-, -ən-/ PAY-lee-on-TOL-ə-jee, PAL-ee-, -⁠ən-), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossils to classify organisms and study their interactions with each other and their environments (their paleoecology). Paleontological observations have been documented as far back as the 5th century BC. The science became established in the 18th century as a result of Georges Cuvier's work on comparative anatomy, and developed rapidly in the 19th century. The term has been used since 1822 formed from Greek παλαιός ('palaios', "old, ancient"), ὄν ('on', (gen. 'ontos'), "being, creature"), and λόγος ('logos', "speech, thought, study").

Paleontology lies on the border between biology and geology, but it differs from archaeology in that it excludes the study of anatomically modern humans. It now uses techniques drawn from a wide range of sciences, including biochemistry, mathematics, and engineering. Use of all these techniques has enabled paleontologists to discover much of the evolutionary history of life, almost back to when Earth became capable of supporting life, nearly 4 billion years ago. As knowledge has increased, paleontology has developed specialised sub-divisions, some of which focus on different types of fossil organisms while others study ecology and environmental history, such as ancient climates. (Full article...)

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Selected article on the prehistoric world and its legacies

Afrasia djijidae is a fossil primate that lived in Myanmar approximately 37 million years ago, during the late middle Eocene. The only species in the genus Afrasia, it was a small primate, estimated to weigh around 100 grams (3.5 oz). Despite the significant geographic distance between them, Afrasia is thought to be closely related to Afrotarsius, an enigmatic fossil found in Libya and Egypt that dates to 38–39 million years ago. If this relationship is correct, it suggests that early simians (a related group or clade consisting of monkeys, apes, and humans) dispersed from Asia to Africa during the middle Eocene and would add further support to the hypothesis that the first simians evolved in Asia, not Africa. Neither Afrasia nor Afrotarsius, which together form the family Afrotarsiidae, is considered ancestral to living simians, but they are part of a side branch or stem group known as eosimiiforms.

Afrasia is known from four isolated molar teeth found in the Pondaung Formation of Myanmar. These teeth are similar to those of Afrotarsius and Eosimiidae, and differ only in details of the chewing surface. For example, the back part of the third lower molar is relatively well-developed. In the Pondaung Formation, Afrasia was part of a diverse primate community that also includes the eosimiid Bahinia and members of the families Amphipithecidae and Sivaladapidae. (see more...)

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Did you know?

Fossil Leurospondylus vertebrae.

... that Leurospondylus ultimus was so named as it was originally thought to be the last occurrence of a plesiosaur?
... that the leaves of two species of the fossil plant genus Banksieaeformis resemble those of the living Banksia serrata?
... that the extinct Actinidia oregonensis was the first kiwi relative described from North America?
... that the extinct rove beetle genus Ektatotricha is known from 15 beetles trapped in Cretaceous amber from Myanmar?
... that UA 8699, a broken molar from the Cretaceous of Madagascar, may be the only Mesozoic marsupial from the southern continents?

... that the wasp Deinodryinus velteni (pictured) is one of only three Deinodryinus species described from the fossil record?
... that the extinct snakefly genera Lebanoraphidia and Iberoraphidia are both named for the regions they were found in?
... that Canadian paleontologist Scott D. Sampson hosted the four episode nature documentary series Dinosaur Planet for the Discovery Channel in 2003?
...that the type specimen of Dromicosuchus had damage to its jaw and neck that may have been inflicted by the teeth of the large carnivore it was found underneath?
... that unlike living rorqual whales, the late Miocene genus Plesiobalaenoptera was probably not capable of ram feeding?

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General images - load new batch

The following are images from various paleontology-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Illustration from William Smith's Strata by Organized Fossils (1817) (from History of paleontology)
Image 2A Spriggina fossil from the Ediacaran (from History of paleontology)
Image 3Elmer Riggs and H.W. Menke in Field Columbian Museum's paleontology lab, 1899 (from History of paleontology)
Image 4Philippe-Charles Schmerling (from List of paleontologists)
Image 5Illustration from Steno's 1667 paper shows a shark head and its teeth along with a fossil tooth for comparison. (from History of paleontology)
Image 6Johann Jakob Scheuchzer tried to explain fossils using Biblical floods in his Herbarium of the Deluge (1709). (from History of paleontology)
Image 7Geologic time scale from an 1861 book by Richard Owen shows the appearance of major animal types. (from History of paleontology)
Image 8Photograph of the second Archaeopteryx skeleton to be found, taken in 1881 at the Natural History Museum, Berlin (from History of paleontology)
Image 9Illustration of the fossil jaw of the Stonesfield mammal from Gideon Mantell's 1848 Wonders of Geology (from History of paleontology)
Image 10A drawing comparing jaws was added in 1799 when Cuvier's 1796 presentation on living and fossil elephants was published. (from History of paleontology)
Image 11A complete Anomalocaris fossil from the Burgess shale (from History of paleontology)
Image 12Illustration of fossil Iguanodon teeth with a modern iguana jaw for comparison from Mantell's 1825 paper describing Iguanodon (from History of paleontology)
Image 13First mention of the word palæontologie, as coined in January 1822 by Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville in his Journal de physique (from History of paleontology)
Image 14Duria Antiquior – A more Ancient Dorset is a watercolor painted in 1830 by the geologist Henry De la Beche based on fossils found by Mary Anning. The late 18th and early 19th century was a time of rapid and dramatic changes in ideas about the history of life on earth. (from History of paleontology)
Image 15Diagram by O.C. Marsh of the evolution of horse feet and teeth, reproduced in T. H. Huxley's 1876 book, Professor Huxley in America (from History of paleontology)
Image 16Stephan Endlicher (from List of paleontologists)
Image 17Fossil of the Taung child discovered in South Africa in 1924 (from History of paleontology)

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Selected article on paleontology in human science, culture and economics

On the Origin of Species, published in 1859, is a work of scientific literature by Charles Darwin which is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. Darwin's book introduced the scientific theory that populations evolve over the course of generations through a process of natural selection. It presented a body of evidence that the diversity of life arose by common descent through a branching pattern of evolution. Darwin included evidence that he had gathered on the Beagle expedition in the 1830s and his subsequent research findings. Ideas about the transmutation of species were controversial as they conflicted with beliefs that species were unchanging parts of a designed hierarchy and that humans were unique and unlike animals.

The book was written for non-specialist readers and attracted widespread interest upon its publication. As Darwin was an eminent scientist, his findings were taken seriously and the evidence he presented generated scientific, philosophical, and religious discussion. Within two decades there was widespread scientific agreement that evolution, with a branching pattern of common descent, had occurred, but scientists were slow to give natural selection the significance that Darwin thought appropriate. During the "eclipse of Darwinism" from the 1880s to the 1930s, various other mechanisms of evolution were given more credit. With the development of the modern evolutionary synthesis in the 1930s and 1940s, Darwin's concept of evolutionary adaptation through natural selection became central to modern evolutionary theory, and it has now become the unifying concept of the life sciences. (see more...)

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On this day...

May 27:

1960 - Robert C. Thorne died in Vernal, Utah, USA.
1967 - Tilly Edinger died of injuries received in a car accident in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA at age 69.
2005 - Geneviève Termier died in Saint-Rémy-lès-Chevreuse, France.

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Selected image

Fossil shell of the parkinsoniid ammonoid Parkinsonia parkinsoni. The shell dates back to the Bajocian age of the Middle Jurassic epoch and is about 14.5 cm in diameter. It was collected in Evrecy, France.
Photo credit: H. Zell