Podcast 330 - Dinosaur Body Pillow
Palaeo After Dark
The gang discusses two papers about the functional morphology of ancient groups of animals. The first paper is a review of how the life position of rangeomorph ediacaran taxa have been reconstructed, and the second paper conducts an actualistic experiment of Oviraptor nesting strategies. Meanwhile, Curt gets activated, James doesn’t die, and Amanda relishes in details. Up-Goer Five (James Edition): The group look at two papers that focus of understanding how things are long dead lived. The first paper talks about strange things that might have either lived standing up or lying down...
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Podcast 329 - Boom Shakalaka
Palaeo After Dark
The gang discusses two papers that use quantitative methods to investigate the biomechanical limitations of extinct organisms. The first paper models the range of jumping potential for a non-avian theropod dinosaur, and the other paper tests if an extinct bird could have skimmed the ocean for food. Meanwhile, James imagines a better future, Amanda is to blame, and Curt is heating up. Up-Goer Five (Amanda Edition): Today our friends look at two papers that talk about how things do stuff. The first paper looks at how a small one of large animals with thick skin and no hair would jump. It...
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Podcast 238 - Fins for Days
Palaeo After Dark
The gang discusses two papers that are united by a fin. The first paper uses a computer algorithms to infer the shape of mosasaur tail fins, and the second paper looks at a new species of Spinosaurus with a crest. Meanwhile, James tastes flavor, Amanda tastes drink, and Curt tastes indifference. Up-Goer Five - SERVER NOT FOUND! HELP! References: Song, Yang, and Johan Lindgren. "Convergence in aquatic locomotion: reconstructing mosasaurian (Squamata: Mosasauria) tail fins from osteological correlates and covariation with extant sharks." Paleobiology 52.1 (2026): 121-130....
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Podcast 327 - Horse or Deer?
Palaeo After Dark
The gang talk about two papers about extraordinary dinosaur fossils and the unique information that can be gleaned from them. The first paper looks at fossil skin data on a Cretaceous iguandodontian, and the second paper uses an exceptionally complete specimen to demonstrate the reality of Nanotyrannus. Meanwhile, James classifies, Amanda imagines T-rex, and Curt brings a unique energy. Up-Goer Five (Curt Edition): The friends look at two papers about big angry animals that everyone loves to talk about. The first paper is about the skin of one of these big angry animals. This skin has...
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Podcast 326 - But What Is It?
Palaeo After Dark
The gang discuss two papers of odd fossils with exceptional preservation. The first paper looks at some Cambrian vertebrates and shows that soft tissue evidence suggests the presence of two sets of camera eyes (four eyes total), and they interpret the additional set of camera eyes as being a homolog to the modern parietal eye in vertebrates. The second paper uses exceptional preservation of the Rhynie Chert to test hypotheses for the taxonomic placement of the enigmatic Prototaxites and finds evidence that suggests it is not, as previously suggested, a fungus. Meanwhile, James is marooned by...
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Podcast 325 - The Curse of the Not Cat
Palaeo After Dark
Listeners, I’m going to level with you. This podcast is cursed. Not because of the content, which is mostly a pretty straight forward discussion about two papers that look into the fossil record of Nimravids (early cats that are not true cats). No, this podcast is cursed because the file refused to be compiled, crashing Audacity 3 times and each time corrupting the save file. The fact that any mp3 file was able to be compiled at all was a minor miracle. I can only assume that this means this podcast data has gained sentience and did not want to be born. I have no control over what happens...
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Podcast 324 - Pick Up the Pieces
Palaeo After Dark
The gang discusses two papers that use fragmentary fossils of animals to investigate the origins of major groups. The first paper describes an Early Ordovician eurypterid, and the second paper looks at mosaic evolutionary patterns in an early squamate. Meanwhile, James has bird opinions, Curt delights in not knowing, and Amanda will definitely be on time. Up-Goer Five (Curt Edition): The friends look at two papers that are using broken bits of things to learn a lot about animals from a long time ago. Both of these papers are looking at old animals that may give us new looks at how big...
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Podcast 323e - "All Sales Final" Part 5 - Another Satisfied Customer
Palaeo After Dark
The crew of the CS Perry struggle to extract themselves from their rapidly deteriorating situation. "Lightless Dawn" , "Spacial Harvest", and "Crypto" from Kevin MacLeod () Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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Podcast 323d - "All Sales Final" Part 4 - The Milk Run
Palaeo After Dark
The crew of the CS Perry, now trapped in a space station run by multiple hostile AI, work to figure out how best to salvage a mission gone very wrong. "Lightless Dawn" and "Crypto" from Kevin MacLeod () Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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Podcast 323c - "All Sales Final" Part 3 - The Hard Sell
Palaeo After Dark
The crew of the CS Perry begin the negotiation process for the CA-chip, but the sales team wants an arm and a leg for the product. "Lightless Dawn" and "Crypto" from Kevin MacLeod () Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
info_outlineWet Hot Archosaur Summer continues as the gang discusses two papers about crocodylomorph evolution. The first paper looks at the impact mass extinctions had on disparity within the group, and the second paper uses new phylogenetic data to revise our understanding of size trends and biogeography of crocodylomorphs during the Cenozoic. Meanwhile, Curt invents a measurement, James invents a new way of eating, and Amanda invents a new phobia for herself.
Up-Goer Five (Curt Edition):
The friends talk about two papers that look at big angry animals that you should never smile at, again! This time they are looking at very old big angry animals you should never smile at. The first paper looks at how different these animals were in the past and looks at how different they are today. A lot of people think that the big angry animals today are not as different than they were in the past and that this might be weird. The paper finds that these big angry animals have been more different in the past, but that the animals today are not so much the same as each other in a weird way. There were times in the past where these animals were as different from each other as we see today, and they even got more different again after that.
The second paper looks at a new way of thinking about two animals from the past that were really big and you really should not smile at. These animals were thought to be part of this one group that is not as big today and also would be really weird because these some of these animals in the past are found across the big blue wet thing and we do not think that they can move across that big blue wet thing because of the stuff that is in the big blue wet thing that is not water that makes your food good. This paper shows that these big animals are probably not in that group, and so they use this to see what this means about where this one group of animals was living and how they got smaller.
References:
Melstrom, Keegan M., et al. "For a while, crocodile: crocodylomorph resilience to mass extinctions." Palaeontology 68.2 (2025): e70005.
Walter, Jules D., et al. "Expanded phylogeny elucidates Deinosuchus relationships, crocodylian osmoregulation and body-size evolution." Communications Biology 8.1 (2025): 611.