The ability to fly won’t save you from becoming a land predator’s next meal. At least, that’s what one pterosaur may have found out. An international research team recently discovered rare neck vertebrae from a prehistoric flying reptile that was likely bitten by a crocodile-like animal 76 million years ago during the Cretaceous Period. The team published their recent findings in the Journal of Palaeontology.This rare find could help researchers better understand the predator-prey dynami ...read more
Just because we haven’t found dinosaur bones near the equator doesn’t mean they don’t exist — just that we haven’t looked in the right places.A study modeling the extinct beasts’ evolution, published in Current Biology, points to the earliest dinosaurs establishing themselves near the Earth’s center, then spreading out to other parts of the globe. So far, the oldest known dinosaur fossils — dating back about 230 million years — hail from farther south, including Brazil, Argenti ...read more
One of the last things you'd think could be lost is a volcano. Yet, when we look at the record of volcanic activity, even in the past few hundred years, there are signals that a large eruption occurred ... we just don't have any other evidence of the source of that big blast. Slowly but surely, through geochemical sleuthing, some of those mystery eruptions have been matched up with volcanoes. It turns out that many times, that source is more surprising than anticipated.A recent study in the Proc ...read more
Back in the days of yore, language translation was a highly specialized profession, critical for coordinating diplomacy or international trade. The first bilingual dictionary book, Vocabularius ex quo, was a German-Latin set of words published in 1467, while clay tablets containing lists of works in Sumerian and Akkadian date back as early as 2300 B.C.Language translation has become easier over the years in many cases thanks to the work of linguists and other anthropologists. The development of ...read more
The avian flu continues to circulate in parts of the world, including the U.S., infecting domestic poultry, cattle, and some humans. A study published in Scientific Advances examines how mass vaccination of poultry against H5 subtypes of avian influenza virus (AIV) — including H5N1 and H5N6 — may help to slow the spread of avian influenza, however, in turn, the vaccination may also lead to the virus evolving faster. Understanding Avian Influenza VirusThe H5 virus is a strain of influenza A ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine