Fossil Friday Roundup: July 27, 2018

Featured Image: Reconstruction of Akainacephalus johnsoni in left lateral view. Preserved material in the skeletal reconstructions is highlighted in orange. From Wiersma and Irmis (2018), CC-BY.

Papers (All Open Access):

• Equatorial cold-water tongue in the Late Ordovician (Geology)
• Stratigraphic characteristics of Quaternary deposits on the left bankof the Sava River near Belgrade (ANNALES GÉOLOGIQUES DE LA PÉNINSULE BALKANIQUE)
• A novel approach to study the morphology and chemistry of pollen in a phylogenetic context, applied to the halophytic taxon Nitraria L.(Nitrariaceae) (PeerJ)
• The influence of different deep-sea coral habitats on sediment macrofaunal community structure and function (PeerJ)
• No substantial long-term bias in the Cenozoic benthic foraminifera oxygen-isotope record (Nature Communications)
• Experimental neoichnology of crawling stalked crinoids (Swiss Journal of Paleontology)
• Shark and ray diversity in the Tropical America (Neotropics)—an examination of environmental and historical factors affecting diversity (PeerJ)
• New insights into Late Triassic dinosauromorph-bearing assemblages from Texas using apomorphy-based identifications (PaleoBios)
• A new southern Laramidian ankylosaurid, Akainacephalus johnsoni gen. et sp. nov., from the upper Campanian Kaiparowits Formation of southern Utah, USA (PeerJ)
• The real Bigfoot: a pes from Wyoming, USA is the largest sauropod pes ever reported and the northern-most occurrence of brachiosaurids in the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation (PeerJ)
• A mandible of Diacodexis cf. gigasei (Artiodactyla, Diacodexeidae) from the Early Eocene locality of Palette (Bouches-du-Rhône, France) (MorphMuseuM)
• Evolutionary transformations of the malleus in pinnipeds, with emphasis on Southern Hemisphere taxa (Contributions to Zoology)
• Differential aging of growth plate cartilage underlies differences in bone length and thus helps determine skeletal proportions (PLOS Biology)
• Non-integumentary melanosomes can bias reconstructions of the colours of fossil vertebrates (Nature Communications)

PrePrints and PostPrints:

• Improvements in the fossil record may largely resolve the conflict between morphological and molecular estimates of mammal phylogeny (bioRXiv)
• Modelling predation and mortality rates from the fossil record of gastropods (bioRXiv)

Community Events, Society Updates, and Resources:

Meetings:

• 78th Annual Meeting, Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (SVP), October 17–20, 2018, Albuquerque, New Mexico (Link)
• 2018 Geological Society of America Annual Meeting, November 4–7, 2018, Indianapolis, Indiana (Link)
• North American Paleontological Convention June 23–27 2019 (Link)

News and Views:

Animals and Anatomy:

• The Real Bigfoot: Behind the scenes with the largest dinosaur foot ever discovered (PeerJ Blog)
• The camarasaur that was more than it seemed (SVPOW)
• Introducing Akainacephalus johnsoni (Letters From Gondwana)
• Fossil Friday – softshell turtle (Valley of the Mastodon)
• Rediscovering a Dinosaur Named Elmer (The Field Museum)

Methods and Musings:

• Geologic Mapping on Mars (Time Scavengers)
• The 10 most common mistakes when choosing a title for your paper (PeerJ Blog)
• Quantum Start-up Week (Musings of a Clumsy Paleontologist)
• 8th Grader Fossil Fun! (Time Scavengers)

Museums, Folks and Fieldwork:

• An Inside View of Dinosaurs in the Wild (Tetrapod Zoology)
• The Evolving Museum Revisited (What’s in John’s Freezer?)
• Ménagerie du Jardin des Plantes (Raptormaniacs)

Art, Books, Culture, Fun:

• Book Review – After Man: A Zoology of the Future (The Inquisitive Biologist)

Do you have some news, a blog, or something just plain cool you want to share with the PLOS Paleo Community? Email it to us at paleocommunity@plos.org, tweet it to us at @PLOSPaleo, or message us on Facebook.

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