How does your plesiosaur swim?
The Fossil Files
For our first paper, we look at some exceptional preservation of soft tissue in Jurassic plesiosaur (large marine reptiles). Detailed preservation of soft tissues to the sub-cellular level is very rare in the fossil record. We discuss this specific example from Germany (which we name Nigel) and the types of analyses that the authors did of its skin and tissues. This new data helps us reconstruct how plesiosaurs may have lived and moved. Or does it? In this from the paper we can see the whole fossil of Nigel (A), a close up of the preserved skin (B and C), and a cross section of the...
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Introducing the Fossil Files
The Fossil Files
In “The Fossil Files”, a pair of palaeontologists delve into the latest discoveries from the world of palaeontology and seek to bring fossils to back to life. Each episode, Susie and Rob will discuss an interesting new research paper ranging from topics of what dinosaurs ate, how plesiosaurs swam, where we came from, and the science of de-extinction. Whilst doing so, we peek under the hood of how the science of palaeontology is done and how research gets to see the light of day. It is accessible to all those interested in palaeontology whether that is students, researchers themselves, or...
info_outlineIn “The Fossil Files”, a pair of palaeontologists delve into the latest discoveries from the world of palaeontology and seek to bring fossils to back to life. Each episode, Susie and Rob will discuss an interesting new research paper ranging from topics of what dinosaurs ate, how plesiosaurs swam, where we came from, and the science of de-extinction. Whilst doing so, we peek under the hood of how the science of palaeontology is done and how research gets to see the light of day. It is accessible to all those interested in palaeontology whether that is students, researchers themselves, or simply the fossil-curious - we laugh as we learn, and hope you will too.
In this trailer we introduce "The Fossil Files" explaining a bit about our approach and our background. In our day jobs, Susannah Maidment (Natural History of London) conducts museum work and fieldwork to reconstruct dinosaur anatomy, evolution and ecology and Robert Sansom (University of Manchester) undertakes fossil and lab analyses to reconstruct early vertebrates, evolutionary relationships and how fossils are formed.