Friday, September 23, 2016 1:37:13 AM
Wanna-Be Dino? Prehistoric Reptile Looked Like a Dinosaur
"All Species Evolved From Single Cell, Study Finds"
Sep 22, 2016 12:00 PM ET
Not all prehistoric animals that looked like dinosaurs were actually dinos, suggests a new fossil.
[inside, doesn't matter, see the video below]
Image: The preserved remains of Triopticus (left) show the evolution of a thickened domed skull in the Triassic Period, 150 million years before the evolution of the famous dome-headed pachycephalosaur dinosaurs, such as Stegoceras (right). The background image shows the field site in Texas where WPA crews in 1940 found the curious fossils of Triopticus. Credit: Michelle Stocker
A reptile that lived before the Dinosaur Age .. http://www.seeker.com/dinosaurs-might-have-gone-up-in-smoke-1921872388.html .. resembled a dino, suggesting that iconic dinosaur body shapes were present long before the dinosaurs themselves actually emerged.
The newly identified reptile, described in the journal Current Biology, resembled pachycephalosaur dinosaurs that lived more than 100 million years later. Other extinct animals found with the reptile looked like later dinos too.
The reptile has been named Triopticus primus, meaning the "First of Three Eyes .. http://www.seeker.com/cyclops-beetle-grows-third-eye-on-its-head-1991098710.html " because the natural pit at the top of its skull lends the appearance of an extra eye.
RELATED: Beachgoer Stumbles Across Dinosaur Footprints
http://www.seeker.com/beachgoer-discovers-cretaceous-dinosaur-footprints-1999964671.html
"Triopticus is an extraordinary example of evolutionary convergence between the relatives of dinosaurs and crocodylians and later dinosaurs that is much more common than anyone ever expected," co-author and project leader Michelle Stocker, a Virgnia Tech College of Science researcher, said in a press release. "What we thought were unique body shapes in many dinosaurs actually evolved millions of years before in the Triassic Period, about 225 million years ago."
Convergence refers to when distantly related animals evolve to look very similar to each other. A classic example of this is a bird wing .. http://www.seeker.com/video-provides-360-degree-view-of-worlds-largest-bat-colony-1880135427.html .. and a bat wing. Both animals use their wings for flight, yet the inner details of their wings are different and evolved independently.
Three Eyes dates to about 230 million years ago, according to the researchers. The reptile's partial skull was originally collected at a site called Otis Chalk near Big Spring, Texas .. http://www.seeker.com/can-texas-actually-secede-from-the-us-1888132808.html , by the Works Progress Administration in 1940.
President Franklin Roosevelt had initiated a monumental effort to put Americans back to work at end the Great Depression. With so much digging going on, numerous fossils were unearthed. In fact, so many fossils were found during such a short time span that several of them were just put into storage uncleaned.
Such was the case for Three Eyes, whose skull was eventually sent to the Texas Vertebrate Paleontology Collections in 2010. It is there that Stocker and her team rediscovered and analyzed the specimen.
They determined that the reptile had an extremely thickened skull roof, just like the very distantly related pachycephalosaur dinosaurs .. http://www.seeker.com/a-real-bonehead-dome-skulled-dino-discovered-1767492263.html .. that lived more than 100 million years after the lifetime of Three Eyes.
WATCH VIDEO: What Color Were the Dinosaurs?
[insert You Tube of embedded video, 'cept it looks to be 8s longer]
"CT scanning showed us that the similarity of Triopticus with the much later dome-headed pachycephalosaur dinosaurs was more than skin deep, extending to the structure of the bone and even the brain." co-author Lawrence Witmer of Ohio University's Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine said.
It was not a coincidence that the reptile and dinosaurs resembled each other.
"After the enormous mass extinction 250 million years ago, reptiles exploded onto the scene and almost immediately diversified into many different sizes and shapes," co-author Sterling Nesbitt of Virginia Tech said. "These early body shapes were later mimicked by dinosaurs."
RELATED: Cave Art Hands Made by Reptile, Not Human
http://www.seeker.com/cave-art-hands-made-by-reptile-not-human-1770954257.html
Dinosaurs did not consciously do this, of course, but their ancestors and environment must have prompted the evolved similarities.
Many of the other Triassic reptiles originally buried with Triopticus at Otis Chalk display features that are easily recognized in later dinosaurs as well. These include the long snouts of Spinosaurus, the toothless beaks of ornithomimids (aka ostrich .. http://www.seeker.com/chicken-sized-ostrich-relative-once-roamed-north-america-1912876596.html .. dinosaurs), and the armor plates of ankylosaurs .. http://www.seeker.com/take-a-stroll-to-the-river-with-ankylosaurus-video-2004167489.html .
"The Otis Chalk fauna is an amazing single snapshot of geologic time where you have this extraordinary range of animal body plans all present at the same time living together," Stocker said. "Among the animals preserved in the Otis Chalk fauna, Triopticus exemplifies this phenomenon of body-shape convergence because its skull shape was repeated by very distantly-related dome-headed dinosaurs more than 100 million years later."
Other studies over the past several years indicate that dinosaurs, like these distant cousins from the Triassic Period .. http://www.seeker.com/triassic-crocodile-relative-unearthed-in-new-mexico-2001287320.html , were all reptiles. Reptiles rapidly evolved in terms of numbers of species soon after the greatest mass extinction of all time on Earth, at the end of the Permian Period.
You can manipulate 3D models of Three Eyes' skull at two different sites: one showing the partial skull alone .. https://sketchfab.com/models/b5fa0e6399d54223915a5587ee69b760 .. and another .. https://sketchfab.com/models/1e9886c651cf42dfb83a2aaa9d99998b .. showing the likely size and shape of the reptile's brain.
SEE PHOTOS: Top 10 Meat-Eating Dinosaurs
[ hmm, lolol, there is a bit more here, but when i try to copy it it changes the text and the image above, then doing
that again didn't change it back .. sorta weird, still haven't figured it out .. i've never seen anything like it before ]
http://www.seeker.com/wanna-be-dino-prehistoric-reptile-looked-like-a-dinosaur-2012556832.html?slide=vIJeAS
.. so there you go .. latest hypothesis is all from a single cell .. if that's hard to grasp have another or even just a peek at
the one this post replies to .. it's all very cool and much more interesting than Adam and Eve could ever be .. though guess that
idea would have been extra engrossing for some way back .. oh, sorry it still has some transfixed, doesn't it .. such a shame that ..
ps: that hmm, just above will probably be easy for others .. not unusual it's just me .. lol
"All Species Evolved From Single Cell, Study Finds"
Sep 22, 2016 12:00 PM ET
Not all prehistoric animals that looked like dinosaurs were actually dinos, suggests a new fossil.
[inside, doesn't matter, see the video below]
Image: The preserved remains of Triopticus (left) show the evolution of a thickened domed skull in the Triassic Period, 150 million years before the evolution of the famous dome-headed pachycephalosaur dinosaurs, such as Stegoceras (right). The background image shows the field site in Texas where WPA crews in 1940 found the curious fossils of Triopticus. Credit: Michelle Stocker
A reptile that lived before the Dinosaur Age .. http://www.seeker.com/dinosaurs-might-have-gone-up-in-smoke-1921872388.html .. resembled a dino, suggesting that iconic dinosaur body shapes were present long before the dinosaurs themselves actually emerged.
The newly identified reptile, described in the journal Current Biology, resembled pachycephalosaur dinosaurs that lived more than 100 million years later. Other extinct animals found with the reptile looked like later dinos too.
The reptile has been named Triopticus primus, meaning the "First of Three Eyes .. http://www.seeker.com/cyclops-beetle-grows-third-eye-on-its-head-1991098710.html " because the natural pit at the top of its skull lends the appearance of an extra eye.
RELATED: Beachgoer Stumbles Across Dinosaur Footprints
http://www.seeker.com/beachgoer-discovers-cretaceous-dinosaur-footprints-1999964671.html
"Triopticus is an extraordinary example of evolutionary convergence between the relatives of dinosaurs and crocodylians and later dinosaurs that is much more common than anyone ever expected," co-author and project leader Michelle Stocker, a Virgnia Tech College of Science researcher, said in a press release. "What we thought were unique body shapes in many dinosaurs actually evolved millions of years before in the Triassic Period, about 225 million years ago."
Convergence refers to when distantly related animals evolve to look very similar to each other. A classic example of this is a bird wing .. http://www.seeker.com/video-provides-360-degree-view-of-worlds-largest-bat-colony-1880135427.html .. and a bat wing. Both animals use their wings for flight, yet the inner details of their wings are different and evolved independently.
Three Eyes dates to about 230 million years ago, according to the researchers. The reptile's partial skull was originally collected at a site called Otis Chalk near Big Spring, Texas .. http://www.seeker.com/can-texas-actually-secede-from-the-us-1888132808.html , by the Works Progress Administration in 1940.
President Franklin Roosevelt had initiated a monumental effort to put Americans back to work at end the Great Depression. With so much digging going on, numerous fossils were unearthed. In fact, so many fossils were found during such a short time span that several of them were just put into storage uncleaned.
Such was the case for Three Eyes, whose skull was eventually sent to the Texas Vertebrate Paleontology Collections in 2010. It is there that Stocker and her team rediscovered and analyzed the specimen.
They determined that the reptile had an extremely thickened skull roof, just like the very distantly related pachycephalosaur dinosaurs .. http://www.seeker.com/a-real-bonehead-dome-skulled-dino-discovered-1767492263.html .. that lived more than 100 million years after the lifetime of Three Eyes.
WATCH VIDEO: What Color Were the Dinosaurs?
[insert You Tube of embedded video, 'cept it looks to be 8s longer]
"CT scanning showed us that the similarity of Triopticus with the much later dome-headed pachycephalosaur dinosaurs was more than skin deep, extending to the structure of the bone and even the brain." co-author Lawrence Witmer of Ohio University's Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine said.
It was not a coincidence that the reptile and dinosaurs resembled each other.
"After the enormous mass extinction 250 million years ago, reptiles exploded onto the scene and almost immediately diversified into many different sizes and shapes," co-author Sterling Nesbitt of Virginia Tech said. "These early body shapes were later mimicked by dinosaurs."
RELATED: Cave Art Hands Made by Reptile, Not Human
http://www.seeker.com/cave-art-hands-made-by-reptile-not-human-1770954257.html
Dinosaurs did not consciously do this, of course, but their ancestors and environment must have prompted the evolved similarities.
Many of the other Triassic reptiles originally buried with Triopticus at Otis Chalk display features that are easily recognized in later dinosaurs as well. These include the long snouts of Spinosaurus, the toothless beaks of ornithomimids (aka ostrich .. http://www.seeker.com/chicken-sized-ostrich-relative-once-roamed-north-america-1912876596.html .. dinosaurs), and the armor plates of ankylosaurs .. http://www.seeker.com/take-a-stroll-to-the-river-with-ankylosaurus-video-2004167489.html .
"The Otis Chalk fauna is an amazing single snapshot of geologic time where you have this extraordinary range of animal body plans all present at the same time living together," Stocker said. "Among the animals preserved in the Otis Chalk fauna, Triopticus exemplifies this phenomenon of body-shape convergence because its skull shape was repeated by very distantly-related dome-headed dinosaurs more than 100 million years later."
Other studies over the past several years indicate that dinosaurs, like these distant cousins from the Triassic Period .. http://www.seeker.com/triassic-crocodile-relative-unearthed-in-new-mexico-2001287320.html , were all reptiles. Reptiles rapidly evolved in terms of numbers of species soon after the greatest mass extinction of all time on Earth, at the end of the Permian Period.
You can manipulate 3D models of Three Eyes' skull at two different sites: one showing the partial skull alone .. https://sketchfab.com/models/b5fa0e6399d54223915a5587ee69b760 .. and another .. https://sketchfab.com/models/1e9886c651cf42dfb83a2aaa9d99998b .. showing the likely size and shape of the reptile's brain.
SEE PHOTOS: Top 10 Meat-Eating Dinosaurs
[ hmm, lolol, there is a bit more here, but when i try to copy it it changes the text and the image above, then doing
that again didn't change it back .. sorta weird, still haven't figured it out .. i've never seen anything like it before ]
http://www.seeker.com/wanna-be-dino-prehistoric-reptile-looked-like-a-dinosaur-2012556832.html?slide=vIJeAS
.. so there you go .. latest hypothesis is all from a single cell .. if that's hard to grasp have another or even just a peek at
the one this post replies to .. it's all very cool and much more interesting than Adam and Eve could ever be .. though guess that
idea would have been extra engrossing for some way back .. oh, sorry it still has some transfixed, doesn't it .. such a shame that ..
ps: that hmm, just above will probably be easy for others .. not unusual it's just me .. lol
It was Plato who said, “He, O men, is the wisest, who like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing”
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