MSGID: 1:317/3 649a65e3   
   PID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
   TID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
    Ancient marine reptile fossil, publish ground-breaking evolutionary   
   insight    
      
     Date:   
         June 26, 2023   
     Source:   
         University of North Florida   
     Summary:   
         Researchers who have unlocked new evolutionary information   
         following the discovery of a 94-million-year-old mosasaur in   
         the gray shale badlands of the National Park Service Glen Canyon   
         National Recreation Area in southern Utah.   
      
      
         Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIN Email   
      
   ==========================================================================   
   FULL STORY   
   ==========================================================================   
   University of North Florida faculty member Dr. Barry Albright is   
   part of a research team led by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM)   
   who have unlocked new evolutionary information following the discovery   
   of a 94-million-year-old mosasaur in the gray shale badlands of the   
   National Park Service Glen Canyon National Recreation Area in southern   
   Utah. Mosasaurs are fully marine-adapted reptiles that swam the seas   
   while dinosaurs ruled the land. The ground-breaking research was just   
   published in Cretaceous Research.   
      
   The journey began nearly 11 years ago as Scott Richardson, a trained   
   volunteer working under Dr. Albright, searched for fossilized remains   
   of creatures that once swam in a vast seaway that covered most of the   
   middle of North America during the Late Cretaceous Period, between 84   
   and 95 million years ago. In March 2012, Richardson found numerous small   
   skull fragments and vertebrae of what proved to be an early mosasaur   
   scattered across a broad shale slope.   
      
   "During the time the Tropic Shale was being deposited, about 94 million   
   years ago, mosasaurs were still very small, primitive, and in the   
   early evolutionary stages of becoming fully marine adapted. For these   
   reasons, their fossils are extremely rare and difficult to find," said   
   Dr. Albright.   
      
   A joint team from the BLM and National Park Service recovered nearly   
   50% of the specimen over the course of the next two field seasons,   
   enough to determine its exact identity. Dr. Alan Titus, BLM Paria   
   River District paleontologist, led a crew of BLM staff and volunteers   
   on the research. The team included volunteer Steve Dahl who was later   
   honored in the species name, Sarabosaurus dahli, or "Dahl's reptile of   
   the mirage." The name alludes to both the ancient seaway in which this   
   animal swam that has long since vanished and the mirages that accompany   
   the region's extreme summer heat.   
      
   "Mosasaurs from younger rocks are relatively abundant, but mosasaurs   
   are extremely rare in rocks older than about 90 million years," said   
   Dr. Titus.   
      
   "Finding one that preserves so much informative data, especially one of   
   this age, is truly a significant discovery."  The oldest mosasaurs are   
   small, about 3 feet long, but they evolved into gigantic lizard-like   
   marine predators that dominated the oceans during the latter part of   
   the dinosaur age. Their land-dwelling ancestors were similar to the   
   modern Komodo Dragon, but through time their aquatic cousins evolved   
   streamlined bodies, paddle-like fins, and tails that propelled them   
   through the water. Early forms were more lizard-like in appearance and   
   retained relatively primitive tails and limbs, but Sarabosaurus possessed   
   one important difference, a new way to circulate blood into its brain.   
      
   "Sarabosaurus sheds light on long-standing questions regarding the   
   relationship of some early branching mosasaurid species, but also   
   provides new insights into the evolution and antiquity of a novel   
   cranial blood supply seen in a particular group of mosasaurs," said   
   Dr. Michael J. Polcyn of the University of Utrecht, Netherlands, and   
   Southern Methodist University, Dallas.   
      
       * RELATED_TOPICS   
             o Earth_&_Climate   
                   # Environmental_Policy # Ice_Ages # Weather #   
                   Exotic_Species # Oceanography # Water # Geography #   
                   Ecosystems   
       * RELATED_TERMS   
             o Geology_of_the_Capitol_Reef_area o   
             Severe_weather_terminology_(United_States) o   
             National_Weather_Service o Timeline_of_Hurricane_Katrina o   
             National_Hurricane_Center o Mount_Rainier o Yellowstone_Caldera   
             o Bermuda_Triangle   
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_North_Florida. Note:   
   Content may be edited for style and length.   
      
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Journal Reference:   
      1. Michael J. Polcyn, Nathalie Bardet, L. Barry Albright, Alan   
      Titus. A new   
         lower Turonian mosasaurid from the Western Interior Seaway and   
         the antiquity of the unique basicranial circulation pattern in   
         Plioplatecarpinae. Cretaceous Research, 2023; 105621 DOI: 10.1016/   
         j.cretres.2023.105621   
   ==========================================================================   
      
   Link to news story:   
   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/06/230626164155.htm   
      
   --- up 1 year, 17 weeks, 10 hours, 50 minutes   
    * Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)   
   SEEN-BY: 15/0 106/201 114/705 123/120 153/7715 218/700 226/30 227/114   
   SEEN-BY: 229/110 112 113 307 317 400 426 428 470 664 700 291/111 292/854   
   SEEN-BY: 298/25 305/3 317/3 320/219 396/45 5075/35   
   PATH: 317/3 229/426