#maganuco

[telodogratis]

Accursio Gallo componente dell’Ufficio di Coordinamento dell’Organismo Congressuale Forense

Accursio Gallo componente dell’Ufficio di Coordinamento dell’Organismo Congressuale Forense

Read More L’avvocato palermitano è subentrato all’avvocato Emanuele Maganuco The post Accursio Gallo componente dell’Ufficio di Coordinamento dell’Organismo Congressuale Forense appeared first on BlogSicilia – Ultime notizie dalla Sicilia. Palermo, accursio gallo, avvocato, Organismo congressuale forense, palermoL’avvocato palermitano è subentrato all’avvocato Emanuele Maganuco The post Accursio…

[nettculture]

Amazing realistic silicone sculptures from Italian sculptor Laira Maganuco at https://lairamaganuco.com/ "Sicilian Old Woman, silicone, cotton, wool, H: 30 cm, © Laira Maganuco

[spookysarcosmic]

Hẻỵ, Gờỗglệ?

Ứmmm

What the hell

[carnegiemuseumnaturalhistory]

Mesozoic Monthly: Scipionyx

My high school calculus teacher, Mr. Surovchak, once told me about a competition he and his brother had every Thanksgiving. They would weigh themselves before and after dinner to indisputably measure who was able to eat the most. When it comes to dinosaurs, it’s typically much harder to tell what and how much they ate. However, a few fossils give us windows into the guts of dinosaurs – literally! Paleontologists are extremely thankful for spectacular fossils like that of Scipionyx samniticus, a small theropod dinosaur with several internal organs preserved!

Oil painting of Scipionyx samniticus in its Early Cretaceous environment by Emiliano Troco, used with permission. You can find more of their work on their Tumblr and contact them via their WordPress site.

Theropods, like Scipionyx, are dinosaurs that stand on two legs, usually with only three prominent toes on each hind foot. Some of the most famous dinosaurs are theropods, like Tyrannosaurus, Velociraptor, and previous Mesozoic Monthly honoree Citipati (does that make it famous? I like to think so). Most theropods interacted with the world primarily with their heads rather than their hands, hence why several of them look like they have oversized skulls and relatively underdeveloped forelimbs. Many also had hollow bones, and, as we can see in extremely well-preserved fossils, feathers. Is this all starting to sound familiar? That’s because these are also features of birds! If you’ve ever heard someone say that birds are dinosaurs, that’s because modern birds, which are called Aves or Neornithes, are just one evolutionary subset of theropod dinosaurs! Birds have all these features of theropod dinosaurs, plus others like toothless beaks and wings made partly from fused wrist and hand bones. If you are eating turkey for Thanksgiving dinner, remember that you’re eating a dinosaur!

Scipionyx didn’t look much like a turkey, though. It belonged to a group of theropods called compsognathids, which were long-tailed, slender, and relatively small predators. It wasn’t imposing size or an especially fascinating appearance that made Scipionyx special – it was the way the only known specimen was fossilized. It is so well preserved that many of its internal organs are intact in its body cavity! Petrified tissue from the trachea, small intestine, and even rectum can be seen in the fossil, as well as muscle tissue, blood vessels, and traces of other organs. We can tell from the bones and scales in its digestive tract that it ate several meals of lizards and fish before it died. There is such a wealth of biological information preserved in this single specimen, and we can learn even more when we consider its relatives. Although skin didn’t preserve in Scipionyx, at least one fossil of another compsognathid named Sinosauropteryx has such well-preserved skin and filament-like ‘protofeathers’ that we can even see pigments preserved! Based on Sinosauropteryx, we can assume that Scipionyx had some sort of filamentous or fuzzy covering as well, at least over some parts of its body.

The incredible fossil of Scipionyx preserves the dinosaur’s internal organs in 3D! For example, the sinuous shape of the small intestine is visible immediately behind the right elbow. Photo by Giovanni Dall’Orto on Wikimedia Commons. You can read more about this specimen in a paper by Dal Sasso and Maganuco (2011).

The fossil of Scipionyx is very small because the individual in question was just a hatchling when it died. Paleontologists can tell it was a hatchling, and not a small adult animal, because its proportions are similar to those of other juvenile dinosaur fossils and many of its bones had not yet fused together (you can learn more about how bones fuse as organisms get older in the Nemicolopterus edition of Mesozoic Monthly). The baby Scipionyx individual represented by the fossil would have measured around 18 inches (46 cm) long in life, and estimates based on how other compsognathids grew suggest that its species reached about 7 feet (2.1 meters) in length at adulthood. Not much is known about its habitat, but it was likely one of the largest animals around. Scipionyx was found in deposits laid down in a marine environment in what is now Italy. Back in the early part of the Cretaceous Period (the third and final division of the Mesozoic Era, or ‘Age of Dinosaurs’), when Scipionyx was alive, Italy was mostly under a shallow sea dotted with small islands, and the dinosaur would have lived on one of these. Since then, tectonic activity has dramatically changed the region, creating new mountains and lowering sea level to what it is today.

So, this Thanksgiving, if you’re looking for a conversation starter at the dinner table/family video call (or if you urgently need to divert discussion from a more sensitive topic), here’s an idea: ask your dining partners whether they think non-avian theropods like Scipionyx would have tasted more like turkey or chicken! Or, if your loved ones would rather learn than debate, you could perhaps offer to read them any of the 12 Mesozoic Monthly animal spotlights (that’s right, December makes one whole year of Mesozoic Monthly!). I’d certainly feel honored to make an appearance at your Thanksgiving feast.

Lindsay Kastroll is a volunteer and paleontology student working in the Section of Vertebrate Paleontology at Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Museum staff, volunteers, and interns are encouraged to blog about their unique experiences and knowledge gained from working at the museum.

[wtf-triassic]

Triadobatrachus massinoti

By Scott Reid

Etymology: Triassic frog

First Described By: Piveteau, 1936

Classification: Biota, Archaea, Proteoarchaeota, Asgardarchaeota, Eukaryota, Neokaryota, Scotokaryota Opimoda, Podiata, Amorphea, Obazoa, Opisthokonta, Holozoa, Filozoa, Choanozoa, Animalia, Eumetazoa, Parahoxozoa, Bilateria, Nephrozoa, Deuterostomia, Chordata, Olfactores, Vertebrata, Craniata, Gnathostomata, Eugnathostomata, Osteichthyes, Sarcopterygii, Rhipidistia, Tetrapodomorpha, Eotetrapodiformes, Elpistostegalia, Stegocephalia, Temnospondyli, Euskelia, Dissorophoidea, Xerodromes, Amphibamiformes, Lissamphibia, Batrachia, Salientia, Triadobatrachidae

Referred Species: T. massinoti

Status: Extinct 

Time and Place: Approximately 251–250 million years ago, in the late Induan to early Olenekian of the Early Triassic.

Triadobatrachus is only known from the Sakamena Formation in Northern Madagascar.

Physical Description: Triadobatrachus superficially resembles modern frogs, it was only around 10 cm long, had a broad head and a very reduced tail. Its skeleton had many features associated only with frogs among amphibians, including a very frog-like skull with big eyes and their characteristically elongated hips. Soft tissues preserved around the fossil even show that it had the wide, round body of frogs too. However, the skeleton of Triadobatrachus differed from living frogs in a few major ways. It had much more vertebrae than living frogs, 26 compared to the maximum 4–9 of frogs alive today, giving it a much longer body, and these vertebrae had ribs, unlike living frogs. Its legs were shorter and more squat, especially its back legs, which were hardly any longer than its front ones, making Triadobatrachus incapable of hopping despite its derived hips. Even the stumpy tail was still more prominent than in living frogs, and may have even retained some degree of mobility. To sum it up, Triadobatrachus more or less looked like a stretched out frog with short legs. Think of a horned toad lizard but with more of the toad part and less horned.

Diet: Like other frogs, Triadobatrachus was probably carnivorous, likely feeding on invertebrates like insects and other arthropods, molluscs, worms, and perhaps even any small vertebrates it could fit in its mouth.

Behavior: One of the most standout features of Triadobatrachus is that it couldn’t have hopped like modern frogs. Instead, Triadobatrachus would have walked around on land more like a salamander, although it is unknown just how much time it would have spent on land in the first place anyway. It was clearly amphibious, and it probably swam by kicking its back legs like frogs, unlike the undulation of newts and salamanders. It would have spawned like living amphibians too, laying shell-less eggs in water that hatched into tadpoles and underwent metamorphosis just like modern frogs. Otherwise, its behaviour is a mystery. We don’t even know if it would have croaked or not.

Ecosystem: Not much is directly known about the ecosystem Triadobatrachus inhabited, as the only known fossil had been washed out to sea along the coast. The intact body at least implies the body wasn’t transported far, so Triadobatrachus probably lived in coastal floodplain rivers and swamps. Various other temnospondyl amphibians are known from the area, including Edingeralla, Deltacephalus, Mahavisaurus, Wantzsosaurus and Tertremoides. Despite being amphibians, many of these temnospondyls were likely euryhaline, meaning they could tolerate salt water and inhabited the coastline, something only a few living amphibians are even remotely capable of standing. The peculiar aquatic reptile Hovasaurus lived along the coasts, although it’s unknown if it ever crossed paths with the freshwater frogs, and terrestrial procolophonid parareptiles were also present. Plant remains suggest the environment was tropical and semi-arid with a monsoonal climate that supported conifer forests along with seed ferns, horsetails and clubmosses.

Other: Triadobatrachus is one of the only known stem-frogs, along with the polish Czatkobatrachus, and is certainly the oldest. The early evolution of Lissamphibia (all living amphibians) is poorly understood, particularly whether their ancestry lies in the temnospondyls or some other “amphibians”. Triadobatrachus doesn’t solve this debate, although it does show similarities to the Permian amphibamiforms like Gerobatrachus, supporting the temnospondyl affinity for batrachians (the frogs and salamanders) amongst dissorophoids.

Before they were considered to be temnospondyls, lissamphibians were often thought to be lepospondyls, a probably paraphyletic or even polyphyletic (i.e. unnatural) collection of “amphibians” on the tetrapod tree more derived than temnospondyls (some may even be honest to goodness amniotes!). This picture is complicated by caecilians, which at one point were suggested to be lepospondyls while batrachians were temnospondyls, making Lissamphibia polyphyletic! The story got even stranger after a little Triassic amphibian, Chinlestegophis, was discovered in 2017 and was considered to be a stem-caecilian. Chinlestegophis pulled caecilians back into temnospondyls with the other lissamphibians, but at almost opposite ends of the temnospondyl tree—batrachians in amphibamiforms and caecilians in with the stereospondyls related to the giant metoposaurs! So lissamphibians may all be temnospondyls...but also polyphyletic, unless nearly all of Temnospondyli is classed as lissamphibians and becomes part of the crown group. This would also mean our small modern amphibians both independently miniaturised from the much larger, classic predatory amphibians of the Palaeozoic and Triassic. What a concept.

Regardless of temnospondyl taxonomic troubles, Triadobatrachus is a perfect transitional form from more generalised amphibians to the highly specialised anatomy of frogs. Particularly, it shows that some of their unique anatomical adaptations evolved before they were able to hop, and may have functioned for other activities like swimming. The almost complete preservation of a skeleton as delicate as one of a small amphibian is a remarkable find, let alone one that represents a perfect transitional form for a group of animals whose evolutionary history is shrouded in mystery, and makes Triadobatrachus a fantastic find, no matter how unassuming it may be.

~ By Scott Reid

Sources under the Cut 

Ascarrunz, Eduardo; Rage, Jean-Claude; Legreneur, Pierre; Laurin, Michel (2016). "Triadobatrachus massinoti, the earliest known lissamphibian (Vertebrata: Tetrapoda) re-examined by µCT-Scan, and the evolution of trunk length in batrachians". Contributions to Zoology. 58 (2): 201–234.

Lires, A. I., Soto, I. M., & Gómez, R. O. (2016). Walk before you jump: new insights on early frog locomotion from the oldest known salientian. Paleobiology, 42(4), 612-623.

Maganuco, S., Steyer, J.S., Pasini, G., Boulay, M., Lorrain, S., Bénéteau, A., Auditore, M. (2009). “An exquisite specimen of Edingerella madagascarensis (Temnospondyli) from the Lower Triassic of NW Madagascar; cranial anatomy, phylogeny, and restorations”. Società italiana di scienze naturali.

Pardo, Jason D.; Small, Bryan J.; Huttenlocker, Adam K. (2017-07-03). "Stem caecilian from the Triassic of Colorado sheds light on the origins of Lissamphibia". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 114 (27): E5389–E5395

Piveteau, J. (1936). "Une forme ancestrale des amphibiens anoures dans le Trias inférieur de Madagascar". Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences. 202: 1607–1608.

Rage,J-C; Roček, Z. (1989). "Redescription of Triadobatrachus massinoti (Piveteau, 1936) an anuran amphibian from the Early Triassic". Palaeontographica Abteilung A. 206: 1–16.

Roček , Z., Rage, J-C. (2000). "13. Proanuran Stages (Triadobatrachus, Czatkobatrachus)". In Heatwole, H.; Carroll, R. L. (eds.). Amphibian Biology. Paleontology: The Evolutionary History of Amphibians. 4. Surrey Beatty & Sons. pp. 1284–1294.

Ročková, H., Roček Z. (2005). “Development of the pelvis and posterior part of the vertebral column in the Anura”. Journal of Anatomy. 206(1): 17–35.

Xing, L., Stanley, E. L., Bai, M., & Blackburn, D. C. (2018). “The earliest direct evidence of frogs in wet tropical forests from Cretaceous Burmese amber”. Scientific reports, 8(1), 8770.

[a-dinosaur-a-day]

Irritator challengeri

By José Carlos Cortés 

Etymology: The One That Irritated

First Described By: Martill et al., 1996

Classification: Dinosauromorpha, Dinosauriformes, Dracohors, Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Averostra, Tetanurae, Orionides, Megalosauroidea, Megalosauria, Spinosauridae, Spinosaurinae

Status: Extinct

Time and Place: Between 110 and 108 million years ago, in the Albian of the Early Cretaceous 

Irritator is known from the Romualdo Member of the Santana Formation in Brazil 

Physical Description: Irritator was a Spinosaurid, so the weird crocodile-mimicking theropods that roamed the Cretaceous landscape across the Southern hemisphere (and some of Europe). Irritator, however, is not known from very much material, despite having loads written about it. It was one of the smaller members of the Spinosaur group, only about 7.5 meters long and not weigh more than one tonne - which may actually indicate it could have still had some sort of fluffy integument, though this still seems unlikely based on its ecology. As a Spinosaur, Irritator would have been fairly bulky, with a long and vaguely crocodilian skull. Its skull also featured a long thin crest going from the midline to the eye, where it flattened into a bulge - this was probably some sort of display structure. Little is known of the rest of its skeleton, but it is known to have had a long and well-clawed hand. It probably had some sort of sail on its back, but it probably was a shorter one, and whether or not its legs were a normal size is unknown. 

By Alexander Vieira, CC BY-SA 4.0 (Irritator is on the far right, in green) 

Diet: Irritator would have mainly fed upon fish and other aquatic organisms.

Behavior: Irritator, being a Spinosaur, spent most of its time in the water, swimming about and searching for food. Since it was rather small, it would have been able to fit in smaller streams of water than most of its other relatives. Though, since it probably still had fairly decent legs, it also would have spent a good amount of time on the land, surveying the shore for food and seeking out prey. Its long snout would then be used to grab fish and other animals from the water, using the lightweight instrument to grab food it might not be able to reach otherwise. While swimming, it would be able to use that snout to reach even more food than before, ducking its head underwater or doing the reverse to hide from land sources of prey. Its very powerful neck muscles would have also been extremely helpful in grabbing and holding onto thrashing prey. 

By Fred Wierum, CC BY 3.0 

Irritator was probably warm-blooded, and used its sail more for display than for keeping warm. This display structure may have been able to change color based on blood circulation or environment in order to send different messages to other members of the species. The crest on the center of the snout also probably served similar features, for displaying to one another. It seems likely that Irritator, like most other dinosaurs, took care of its young; but there is no evidence either way to support that hypothesis. 

By PaleoGeekSquared, CC BY 3.0 

Ecosystem: Irritator lived in the Romualdo Environment of Brazil, which was a basin of lakes surrounded by rivers and other wetland environments, filled to the brim with a wide variety of plantlife. Nearby was the burgeoning Atlantic Ocean, making this a Spinosaur’s favorite place of all. Here there were a wide variety of early flowering plants like magnolias, seagrasses, and lilies - all of which were associated heavily with this aquatic environment. There were many types of ray-finned fish, which would have been the primary source of prey for Irritator, as well as lobe-finned fish which would have also been decent sources of food. Sharks seem to have been rare. There were plenty of turtles too, including one of the earliest sea turtles Santanachelys. This was the land of extreme pterosaurs, including Anhanguera, Arirpesaurus, Barbosania, Brasileodactylus, Cearadacytlus, Maaradactylus, Santanadactylus, Tapejara, Thalassodromeus, Tropeognathus, Tupuxuara, and Unwindia. There was also a Notosuchian, Araripesuchus. There were other dinosaurs there too - the compsognathid Mirischia and the Tyrannosauroid Santanaraptor, which would have mainly fed on small animal prey. 

By Scott Reid

Other: Irritator was found as part of the illegal fossil trade, initially mistake for a pterosaur, then a maniraptoran, before being finally identified as a spinosaur. The confusion surrounding this fossil - and the fact that the snout had been artificially elongated by the fossil traders - lead to its name. Its position within the Spinosaurs is well supported, and it seems to have been at least somewhat closely related to Spinosaurus itself, rather than Baryonyx on the other end of the family tree.

~ By Meig Dickson

Sources under the Cut 

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Kellner, A.W.A. (2001). "New information on the theropod dinosaurs from the Santana Formation (Aptian-Albian), Araripe Basin, Northeastern Brazil". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 21 (supplement to 3): 67A.

Kellner, A.W.A.; Campos, D.A. (2002). "The function of the cranial crest and jaws of a unique pterosaur from the early Cretaceous of Brazil". Science. 297 (5580): 389–392.

Kellner, A. W. A., S. A. K. Azevedo, E. B. Machado, L. B. Carvalho, and D. D. R. Henriques. 2011. A new dinosaur (Theropoda, Spinosauridae) from the Cretaceous (Cenomanian) Alcântara Formation, Cajual Island, Brazil. Anais da Academia Brasileira de Ciências 83(1):99-108

Lee, Yuong-Nam; Barsbold, Rinchen; Currie, Philip J.; Kobayashi, Yoshitsugu; Lee, Hang-Jae; Godefroit, Pascal; Escuillié, François; Chinzorig, Tsogtbaatar (2014). "Resolving the long-standing enigmas of a giant ornithomimosaur Deinocheirus mirificus". Nature. 515 (7526): 257–260.

Lopes, Reinaldo José (September 2018). "Entenda a importância do acervo do Museu Nacional, destruído pelas chamas no RJ". Folha de S.Paulo (in Portuguese).

Mabesoone, J.M.; Tinoco, I.M. (1973-10-01). "Palaeoecology of the Aptian Santana Formation (Northeastern Brazil)". Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. 14 (2): 97–118.

Machado, E.B.; Kellner, A.W.A. (2005). "Notas Sobre Spinosauridae (Theropoda, Dinosauria)" (PDF). Anuário do Instituto de Geociências – UFRJ (in Portuguese). 28 (1): 158–173.

Machado, E.B.; Kellner, A.W.A.; Campos, D.A. (2005). "Preliminary information on a dinosaur (Theropoda, Spinosauridae) pelvis from the Cretaceous Santana Formation (Romualdo Member) Brazil". Congresso Latino-Americano de Paleontologia de Vertebrados. 2 (Boletim de resumos): 161–162.

Machado, E.B.; Kellner, A.W.A. (2008). "An overview of the Spinosauridae (Dinosauria, Theropoda) with comments on the Brazilian material". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 28(3): 109A.

Martill, D. M., A. R. I. Cruickshank, E. Frey, P. G. Small, and M. Clarke. 1996. A new crested maniraptoran dinosaur from the Santana Formation (Lower Cretaceous) of Brazil. Journal of the Geological Society, London 153:5-8

Martill, David M. (2011). "A new pterodactyloid pterosaur from the Santana Formation (Cretaceous) of Brazil". Cretaceous Research. 32 (2): 236–243.

Martill, David; Frey, Eberhard; Sues, Hans-Dieter; Cruickshank, Arthur R.I. (2011-02-09). "Skeletal remains of a small theropod dinosaur with associated soft structures from the Lower Cretaceous Santana Formation of NE Brazil". Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences. 37 (6): 891–900.

Mateus, Octávio; Araujo, Ricardo; Natario, Carlos; Castanhinha, Rui (2011-04-21). "A new specimen of the theropod dinosaur Baryonyx from the early Cretaceous of Portugal and taxonomic validity of Suchosaurus". Zootaxa: 54–68.

Medeiros, M. A. 2006. Large theropod teeth from the Eocenomanian of northeastern Brazil and the occurrence of Spinosauridae. Revista Brasileira de Paleontologia 9(3):333-338

Medeiros, Manuel Alfredo; Lindoso, Rafael Matos; Mendes, Ighor Dienes; Carvalho, Ismar de Souza (August 2014). "The Cretaceous (Cenomanian) continental record of the Laje do Coringa flagstone (Alcântara Formation), northeastern South America". Journal of South American Earth Sciences. 53: 50–58.

Milner, Andrew; Kirkland, James (2007). "The case for fishing dinosaurs at the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site at Johnson Farm". Utah Geological Survey Notes. 39 (3): 1–3.

Naish, D.; Martill, D.M.; Frey, E. (2004). "Ecology, Systematics and Biogeographical Relationships of Dinosaurs, Including a New Theropod, from the Santana Formation (?Albian, Early Cretaceous) of Brazil". Historical Biology. 16 (2–4): 57–70.

Naish, D., and D. M. Martill. 2007. Dinosaurs of Great Britain and the role of the Geological Society of London in their discovery: basal Dinosauria and Saurischia. Journal of the Geological Society, London 164:493-510

Pêgas, R.V.; Costa, F.R.; Kellner, A.W.A. (2018). "New Information on the osteology and a taxonomic revision of the genus Thalassodromeus (Pterodactyloidea, Tapejaridae, Thalassodrominae)". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 38 (2): e1443273.

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Sánchez-Hernández, B., M. J. Benton, and D. Naish. 2007. Dinosaurs and other fossil vertebrates from the Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous of the Galve area, NE Spain. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 249:180-215

Sayão, Juliana; Saraiva, Antonio; Silva, Helder; Kellner, Alexander (2011). "A new theropod dinosaur from the Romualdo Lagerstatte (Aptian-Albian), Araripe Basin, Brazil". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 31: supplement 2: 187.

Sereno, P.C.; Beck, A.L.; Dutheuil, D.B.; Gado, B.; Larsson, H.C.; Lyon, G.H.; Marcot, J.D.; Rauhut, O.W.M.; Sadleir, R.W.; Sidor, C.A.; Varricchio, D.; Wilson, G.P.; Wilson, J.A. (1998). "A long-snouted predatory dinosaur from Africa and the evolution of spinosaurids". Science. 282 (5392): 1298–1302.  

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Witmer, L.M. 1995.The Extant Phylogenetic Bracket and the Importance of Reconstructing Soft Tissues in Fossils. in Thomason, J.J. (ed). Functional Morphology in Vertebrate Paleontology. New York. Cambridge University Press. pp. 19–33.

Witton, Mark P. (2018-01-01). "Pterosaurs in Mesozoic food webs: a review of fossil evidence". Geological Society, London, Special Publications. 455 (1): 7–23.

Xu, X.; Currie, P.; Pittman, M.; Xing, L.; Meng, Q.; Lü, J.; Hu, D.; Yu, C. (2017). "Mosaic evolution in an asymmetrically feathered troodontid dinosaur with transitional features". Nature Communications. 8: 14972.

[baccillierealessandra]

My paradise 🌊// #adventuresinsicily #maganuco #beach #sealife #vsco #vscocam (presso Maganuco)

[italreport]

Acate. “La pineta...che non c’è ”.

Salvatore Cultraro, Acate (Rg) 14 ottobre 2021.- L’area verde, compresa tra il muro di recinzione del cimitero comunale e la Biblioteca Civica “E. Maganuco”, oggi avrebbe dovuto ospitare una verdeggiante, anche se piccola, pineta. Purtroppo della programmata “pineta”, sono presenti solo “quattro” alberi. Ma veniamo ai fatti. Nel lontano 1999, l’allora amministrazione comunale Battaglia fece…

Acate. “La pineta…che non c’è ”. was originally published on ITALREPORT

[lamilanomagazine]

Milano, al Museo di Storia Naturale è arrivato il Saltriovenator: il primo e unico dinosauro lombardo

Milano, dopo 200 milioni di anni, il primo e unico dinosauro lombardo rivive in una scultura stupefacente ed è destinato a diventare un’icona rappresentativa del Museo e delle collezioni che custodisce ed espone. Una posa vigile e non aggressiva, un passo naturale nel verde di una aiuola. A lato della scalinata che si affaccia su Corso Venezia, il dinosauro rappresenta nel contempo un richiamo alla visita delle ricche raccolte naturalistiche del Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano, che è il più antico museo civico e il più grande del genere in Italia. Il dinosauro in questione è un Saltriovenator adulto, il cui fossile fu scoperto 25 anni fa da Angelo Zanella in una cava in provincia di Varese: poche ossa ma significative, che indicavano una specie nuova per la scienza. Il primo dinosauro lombardo si rivelò infatti essere anche il più grande dinosauro carnivoro del Giurassico inferiore e il più antico rappresentante al mondo del gruppo dei Ceratosauri. Vista l’importanza di questa scoperta, nel 2018 la prestigiosa rivista scientifica internazionale PeerJ pubblicò un articolo scientifico che descriveva in dettaglio “Saltriovenator zanellai”. Nelle forme, nelle proporzioni e nei dettagli il modello installato nei Giardini Montanelli è di qualità museale in quanto riproduce fedelmente le caratteristiche anatomiche descritte dai paleontologi nell’articolo. "Questa bella iniziativa – ricorda Filippo Del Corno, assessore alla Cultura - in realtà il frutto del lavoro di ricerca dei nostri istituti scientifici e museali, in particolare dei nostri paleontologi che hanno collaborato alla realizzazione del modello in modo che fosse il più rispondente possibile ai risultati scientifici" Promossa da Comune di Milano-Cultura e Museo di Storia Naturale, la realizzazione del Saltriovenator è ad opera di Geo-Model, ma è il frutto di un lungo lavoro seguito passo dopo passo da Cristiano Dal Sasso e Simone Maganuco, paleontologi del Museo. Tutto è iniziato al computer con una modellazione digitale in 3D (opera del paleoartista Davide Bonadonna), poi trasformata in oggetto fisico a grandezza naturale: un sofisticato robot a controllo numerico (Bat-Tech Italia) ha scolpito una maquette in polisitirene. Questa è stata poi rivestita di plastilina e scolpita a mano in tutti i dettagli della pelle da cinque modellisti (Alessandro Ambrosini, Denise Boccacci, Andrea Leanza, Andrea Masi e Francesca Penzo), sotto la scrupolosa direzione artistica di Scaggiante. Dai calchi di questa scultura, realizzati dai ragazzi dello staff con l'aiuto di Maurizio Ceolin, si sono ricavati i positivi in vetroresina, che sono stati assemblati su un basamento in ferro con finitura Corten tramite giunti interni di sostegno in acciaio (sempre a opera di Bat-Tech Italia). Sul basamento sono state impresse orme identiche a quelle ritrovate fossilizzate nei dintorni di Rovereto, che sono state attribuite a dinosauri analoghi a Saltriovenator, vissuti nello stesso periodo geologico: l’inizio del Giurassico. Sulla pelle la colorazione è stata fatta squama per squama, sempre a mano, da Alessandro Ambrosini. Gli occhi sono stati realizzati su misura. I numeri del modello Il modello, realizzato in vetroresina ad alta resistenza, rappresenta un Saltriovenator lungo 750 cm, con una altezza al bacino di 220 cm e una coda di 340 cm, mentre la testa misura 80 cm. Ci sono voluti quasi 9 mesi dal primo bozzetto alla finitura dell'ultimo particolare: un'impresa alla quale hanno partecipato 15 persone tra paleontologi, illustratori, modellatori, scultori, decoratori, artigiani, operai, ingegneri, grafici e manovratori. Per il Saltriovenator sono stati utilizzati: - 8 metri cubi di polistirene - 150 kg di plastilina - 20 kg di silicone per stampi - 500 kg di resina poliestere - 100 kg di fibra di vetro - 5 kg di vernici in vari colori - 500 kg di ferro Per la parte tecnologica sono stati impiegati: - hardware e software per la modellazione 3D del dinosauro e la progettazione del suo basamento - stampante 3D per produrre i prototipi (modellini) in scala ridotta - robot a controllo numerico per la fresatura in scala 1 a 1 dei volumi di polistirene - laser per il taglio delle lamiere e l'incisione della didascalia La scultura assemblata al basamento e alla fascia didascalica pesa quasi 2 tonnellate. Il codice QR posizionato lungo la recinzione permette di accedere a testi e contenuti multimediali che spiegano il “dietro le quinte” della realizzazione. Read the full article

[devatafromnowhere]

Laira Maganuco

[forzalazio15]

Camaleón híbrido por el artista italiano Laira Maganuco. https://www.instagram.com/p/B8BOsqOnMQa/?igshid=t9h53cq2pl6b

[foxpapa]

I paleontologi Cristiano Dal Sasso e Simone Maganuco

Credit: Giovanni Bindellini

Lo hanno chiamato Razana. Era lungo sette metri e pesante una tonnellata, con un cranio alto e massiccio dotato di robuste mascelle armate di enormi denti seghettati, pronti a triturare ossa. Era il temibile coccodrillo giurassico con il morso da T. rex, vissuto 170 milioni di anni fa nella parte meridionale del supercontinente Gondwana, corrispondente all'attuale Madagascar. L'identikit arriva da uno studio pubblicato su Peer J da un gruppo di paleontologi italiani e francesi, guidato da Cristiano Dal Sasso del Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano

[curiositydotcom]

Learn about how your ancestors’ work habits might be influencing your own; the first evidence of an underwater dinosaur; and how an aquarium successfully reproduced coral in captivity for the first time.

Societies with a history of hard farming labor tend to work more hours today by Kelsey Donk

Arduous farm labor in the past means longer working hours today. (2020). EurekAlert! https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-04/oupu-afl041420.php 

Fouka, V., & Schläpfer, A. (2020). Agricultural Returns to Labour and the Origins of Work ethics*. The Economic Journal. https://doi.org/10.1093/ej/ueaa029 

Luzer, D. (2013, September 4). Study: The Protestant Work Ethic Is Real. Pacific Standard. https://psmag.com/economics/protestant-worth-ethic-real-65544 

Spenkuch, J. L. (2017). Religion and work: Micro evidence from contemporary Germany. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 135, 193–214. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2017.01.011 

Glaeser, E. L., Alesina, A., & Sacerdote, B. (2012). Work and Leisure in the U.S. and Europe: Why So Different. Harvard.Edu. https://scholar.harvard.edu/glaeser/publications/work-and-lesiure-us-and-europe-why-so-different 

Scientists have discovered the first unambiguous evidence of a water-dwelling dinosaur by Grant Currin

New fossils rewrite the story of dinosaur evolution and ecology - and change the appearance of Spinosaurus. (2020, April 29). National Geographic Society Newsroom. https://blog.nationalgeographic.org/2020/04/29/new-fossils-rewrite-the-story-of-dinosaur-evolution-and-ecology-and-change-the-appearance-of-spinosaurus/ 

Ibrahim, N., Maganuco, S., Dal Sasso, C., Fabbri, M., Auditore, M., Bindellini, G., Martill, D. M., Zouhri, S., Mattarelli, D. A., Unwin, D. M., Wiemann, J., Bonadonna, D., Amane, A., Jakubczak, J., Joger, U., Lauder, G. V., & Pierce, S. E. (2020). Tail-propelled aquatic locomotion in a theropod dinosaur. Nature, 581(7806), 67–70. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2190-3 

An aquarium successfully reproduced coral in captivity for the first time by Grant Currin

Alaa Elassar, CNN. (2020, April 22). How scientists could save coral from brink of extinction. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/22/us/florida-aquarium-first-reproduce-ridhed-cactus-coral-trnd/index.html 

‌The Florida Aquarium Becomes First Organization in History to Induce Spawning of Atlantic Coral; A New Hope to Save Florida’s Reefs. (2019). Flaquarium.org. https://www.flaquarium.org/pressroom/posts/the-florida-aquarium-becomes-first-organization-in-history-to-induce-spawning-of-atlantic-coral-a-ne

US Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (2020). What Are Corals? Corals Tutorial. NOAA.gov. https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/education/tutorial_corals/coral01_intro.html 

Getting Coral To Reproduce. (2019, August 25). NPR.org. https://www.npr.org/2019/08/25/754122930/getting-coral-to-reproduce

Subscribe to Curiosity Daily to learn something new every day with Cody Gough and Ashley Hamer. You can also listen to our podcast as part of your Alexa Flash Briefing; Amazon smart speakers users, click/tap “enable” here: https://www.amazon.com/Curiosity-com-Curiosity-Daily-from/dp/B07CP17DJY 

[kristablogs]

The Sahara Desert was once flooded with history’s most vicious dinosaurs

Huge predatory dinosaurs—like the abelisaur, a short-snouted predatory dinosaur and the pterosaur, both pictured here—once roamed regions of what is now the Sahara Desert. (Artwork by Davide Bonadonna, under the scientific supervision of Simone Maganuco and Nizar Ibrahim/)

During these times of quarantine, last month feels like 100 million years ago. But if you were to actually go back to that period of time and make your way to the western Sahara, you’d likely run into a whole new set of problems in the form of hordes of enormous predators, according to a new study.

Instead of a desert, the region was covered by a vast river system that flowed up through present-day Morocco and Algeria. Strangely, paleontologists have found very few fossils of the plant-eating dinosaurs that roamed much of the world at the time. Rather, many of the fossils they have identified belonged to flesh-eating dinosaurs, flying reptiles called pterosaurs, and ancestors of modern crocodiles.

“It was arguably the most dangerous place in the history of planet Earth because it was home to so many different kinds of predators in all shapes and sizes,” says Nizar Ibrahim, a paleontologist at the University of Detroit Mercy. “This river of giants is unlike any ecosystem today, and in fact it’s also pretty unique compared to other dinosaur age ecosystems.”

Ibrahim and his colleagues have taken a sweeping look at the denizens and geology of this ecosystem, the remnants of which are preserved in the rock formations in eastern Morocco known as the Kem Kem Group or Kem Kem beds. Their report, published on April 21 in the journal ZooKeys, is based on the team’s findings from two decades of expeditions to the area and visits to fossil collections in museums around the world.

“This work represents the first detailed synthesis of all previous works on the geology and the paleontology of the Kem Kem Beds, and the first attempt to reconstruct the environmental conditions in this zone of North Africa between 100 and 95 million years ago,” Andrea Cau, an independent researcher who has collaborated with museums and universities in Italy, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere, told Popular Science in an email.

While some of the paleontological findings are still preliminary and will need to be confirmed with more detailed studies, the report could provide a valuable resource for paleontologists on future expeditions in the area, said Cau, who has studied the Kem Kem Group and other ancient ecosystems in northern Africa.

The area dubbed the Kem Kem Group consists of layers of sedimentary rock exposed on a long, winding escarpment near the border between Morocco and Algeria. The fossils found here are a motley bunch.

“You get very small things—tiny little amphibians and delicate plants—all the way up to massive dinosaurs,” Ibrahim says. A few of these fossils represent herbivorous dinosaurs such as the long-necked sauropods. But these creatures don’t seem to be nearly as common as their carnivorous kin, a pattern that paleontologists have noted in sites across northern Africa since the 1930s.

These fearsome beasts included at least four large predatory dinosaurs. One belonged to a group called abelisaurids; its short snout and relatively small teeth suggest it may have been a scavenger. Paleontologists have also unearthed fossils from a Spinosaurus with a narrow snout and teeth specialized for puncturing and snaring fish, a fleet-footed raptor around 26 feet long, and a massive hunter with serrated teeth that resembled steak knives known as Carcharodontosaurus saharicus that was nearly the size of T-rex. Meanwhile, pterosaurs with wingspans between 13 and 20 feet soared overhead and sharks and crocodile-like creatures the length of a school bus prowled the waters.

“If you were to visit this place as a human being, there really are many different ways to die,” Ibrahim says. “You wouldn’t be safe anywhere.”

By examining the broad assortment of fossils from this harrowing environment, Ibrahim says, he and his team hoped to better understand how the “incredible abundance” of predators coexisted and what they dined on. The researchers observed that the skulls belonging to carnivores from the Kem Kem Group varied quite a bit, suggesting they were specialized to feed on different kinds of prey. This might have allowed the predators to stay out of each other’s way and avoid having to compete for the same meals. In many cases, these meals would have been seafood. Fish appear to have been the most plentiful food source at the time, with some of these swimmers reaching the size of SUVs.

In today’s landscapes, top predators such as wolves and lions are well outnumbered by their herbivorous prey. However, even during the mid-Cretaceous Period when northern Africa was covered by vast river systems, ecosystems dominated by so many bulky predators would have been rare. “In some ways it’s more similar to what you might see in marine ecosystems, where predators are actually more common,” Ibrahim says.

The landscape these animals lived in was filled with meandering rivers, lakes, and mudflats. This suggests that the region couldn’t support enough vegetation for long enough periods of time to feed large numbers of plant-eating dinosaurs, Ibrahim says.

However, there may be other reasons why paleontologists have found so few remnants of large herbivores in this area. Most of the sauropod fossils from this region are single bones or isolated fragments rather than more complete skeletons, which makes it hard to determine which species they belonged to, Philip Mannion, a paleontologist at University College London who was not involved in the research, said in an email. Sauropods also tend to have similar-looking teeth, and the vertebrae that would be more revealing are often fragile and less likely to be preserved.

“We can't ultimately be sure that [the fossils] don't reflect a greater diversity,” he said. It’s also possible that these plant-eating dinosaurs primarily lived and died in other nearby habitats and only rarely ventured into the areas that happened to be preserved in the Kem Kem Group.

For Ibrahim, the Kem Kem Group is a reminder that the ecosystems of the past could be governed by very different rules from those we see today. This isn’t surprising, he says, given that more than 99 percent of all organisms that ever existed died out before the little slice of time we call the present.

“The Sahara is a breathtaking place as it is, but when you’re out there in this dry and inhospitable place and you pick up giant fish scales and crocodile teeth, that really gives you a sense of what we call deep time,” he says. “That’s when you really understand how much our planet has and can change over time.”

[a-dinosaur-a-day]

Saltriovenator zanellai

By Guidy Cook

Etymology: Hunter from Saltrio

First Described By: Dal Sasso et al., 2018

Classification: Dinosauromorpha, Dinosauriformes, Dracohors, Dinosauria, Saurischia, Eusaurischia, Theropoda, Neotheropoda, Averostra, Ceratosauria

Status: Extinct

Time and Place: Saltriovenator lived between 199.3 and 197.5 million years ago, in the Sinemurian age of the Early Jurassic 

Saltriovenator is only found in the lower layers of the Saltrio Formation of Lombardy, Italy 

Physical Description: Saltriovenator is one of the earliest examples of a Ceratosaur, found at the beginning of the Jurassic period, much earlier than most other members of the group. Ceratosaurs were a group of basal theropods that lasted throughout the Jurassic and Cretaceous, and were some of the largest carnivores in their environments - and some of the most agile large carnivores, aside from Tyrannosaurids. Thus, Saltriovenator is vital in our understandings of the origin of this group at the base of the Triassic-Jurassic transition.

Saltriovenator is known primarily from parts of the jaw, arms, ribs, and lower leg, so it’s difficult to say much about it specifically compared to other members of the group. The one specimen of this animal is a subadult, so it probably got bigger than current length estimates for the creature, at 7.3 meters long. Still, this means it was probably one of the largest predatory dinosaurs at the time, longer than any other that existed at this point. It actually might have been slightly longer than the much later Ceratosaurus. It had a very delicate skull, and a narrow lower jaw like Allosaurus rather than its much closer relative Ceratosaurus. It had long, narrow teeth, and hands similar to its relative Ceratosaurus, with slightly bended fingers. It also had medium-length, skinny lower legs, and a fairly robust torso. It’s tail, not being a Tetanuran, was more floppy than most other Theropods.  

By Cristiano Dal Sasso, Simone Maganuco, Andrea Cau. CC BY 4.0

As a Ceratosaur, it is unlikely that Saltriovenator would have been particularly feathery, however, its small size makes it possible that it would have retained some feathers for thermoregulation.

Diet: As a Ceratosaur, closely related to Ceratosaurus and Berberosaurus and similar in overall jaw shape, Saltriovenator was a carnivore, probably an obligate one, feeding on small to medium sized prey in its environment.

Behavior: It is uncertain if predators such as Saltriovenator and other early Ceratosaurs were particularly social in terms of hunting and lifestyle. The fact that one skeleton was found alone tells us little, as well - it seems entirely likely that the skeleton was washed out to sea, making determining behavior difficult. Like other dinosaurs, it probably would have taken care of its young; the small forelimbs were probably not used much in hunting, though it did have robust hands that could have been used in manipulating tough or fidgety food. It is probably unlikely to have been very fast, though without information about the thighs and calves it is difficult to say either way on that score. 

By Lucas Atwell, CC BY-SA 3.0

Ecosystem: The Saltrio Formation is actually an aquatic formation, filled with a variety of ocean-dwelling invertebrates such as crinoids, bivalves, brachiopods, bryozoans, and ammonites. Thus, this probably isn’t the environment Saltriovenator lived in, and it’s difficult to say what sort of ecosystem it called home. However, it probably did live along the beach, feeding on small animals in the same region. It probably even fed on a fish or two, including sharks known from the area. There were probably some other early dinosaurs around, too, but they are not well known.

Other: Basal Ceratosaurs have a fairly messy phylogeny - it is uncertain where they go and who is more closely related to what. For now, Saltriovenator has not helped that picture much, but it does appear to be the closest relative of Berberosaurus. Saltriovenator shows a mixture of characteristics shared by early Tetanurans and Ceratosaurs. Saltriovenator also helped to fully debunk one of the more esoteric “birds-are-not-dinosaurs” arguments, so that’s nice.

~ By Meig Dickson

Sources under the cut 

Dal Sasso, C., S. Maganuco, A. Cau. 2018. The oldest ceratosaurian (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Lower Jurassic of Italy sheds light on the evolution of the three-fingered hand of birds. PeerJ 6: e5976.

Lualdi, A. 1999. New data on the Western part of the M. Nudo Basin (Lower Jurassic, West Lobardy). Tubingen Geowissenschaftliche Arbeiten A (52): 173 - 176.

[scootoaster]

The Sahara Desert was once flooded with history’s most vicious dinosaurs

Huge predatory dinosaurs—like the abelisaur, a short-snouted predatory dinosaur and the pterosaur, both pictured here—once roamed regions of what is now the Sahara Desert. (Artwork by Davide Bonadonna, under the scientific supervision of Simone Maganuco and Nizar Ibrahim/)

During these times of quarantine, last month feels like 100 million years ago. But if you were to actually go back to that period of time and make your way to the western Sahara, you’d likely run into a whole new set of problems in the form of hordes of enormous predators, according to a new study.

Instead of a desert, the region was covered by a vast river system that flowed up through present-day Morocco and Algeria. Strangely, paleontologists have found very few fossils of the plant-eating dinosaurs that roamed much of the world at the time. Rather, many of the fossils they have identified belonged to flesh-eating dinosaurs, flying reptiles called pterosaurs, and ancestors of modern crocodiles.

“It was arguably the most dangerous place in the history of planet Earth because it was home to so many different kinds of predators in all shapes and sizes,” says Nizar Ibrahim, a paleontologist at the University of Detroit Mercy. “This river of giants is unlike any ecosystem today, and in fact it’s also pretty unique compared to other dinosaur age ecosystems.”

Ibrahim and his colleagues have taken a sweeping look at the denizens and geology of this ecosystem, the remnants of which are preserved in the rock formations in eastern Morocco known as the Kem Kem Group or Kem Kem beds. Their report, published on April 21 in the journal ZooKeys, is based on the team’s findings from two decades of expeditions to the area and visits to fossil collections in museums around the world.

“This work represents the first detailed synthesis of all previous works on the geology and the paleontology of the Kem Kem Beds, and the first attempt to reconstruct the environmental conditions in this zone of North Africa between 100 and 95 million years ago,” Andrea Cau, an independent researcher who has collaborated with museums and universities in Italy, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere, told Popular Science in an email.

While some of the paleontological findings are still preliminary and will need to be confirmed with more detailed studies, the report could provide a valuable resource for paleontologists on future expeditions in the area, said Cau, who has studied the Kem Kem Group and other ancient ecosystems in northern Africa.

The area dubbed the Kem Kem Group consists of layers of sedimentary rock exposed on a long, winding escarpment near the border between Morocco and Algeria. The fossils found here are a motley bunch.

“You get very small things—tiny little amphibians and delicate plants—all the way up to massive dinosaurs,” Ibrahim says. A few of these fossils represent herbivorous dinosaurs such as the long-necked sauropods. But these creatures don’t seem to be nearly as common as their carnivorous kin, a pattern that paleontologists have noted in sites across northern Africa since the 1930s.

These fearsome beasts included at least four large predatory dinosaurs. One belonged to a group called abelisaurids; its short snout and relatively small teeth suggest it may have been a scavenger. Paleontologists have also unearthed fossils from a Spinosaurus with a narrow snout and teeth specialized for puncturing and snaring fish, a fleet-footed raptor around 26 feet long, and a massive hunter with serrated teeth that resembled steak knives known as Carcharodontosaurus saharicus that was nearly the size of T-rex. Meanwhile, pterosaurs with wingspans between 13 and 20 feet soared overhead and sharks and crocodile-like creatures the length of a school bus prowled the waters.

“If you were to visit this place as a human being, there really are many different ways to die,” Ibrahim says. “You wouldn’t be safe anywhere.”

By examining the broad assortment of fossils from this harrowing environment, Ibrahim says, he and his team hoped to better understand how the “incredible abundance” of predators coexisted and what they dined on. The researchers observed that the skulls belonging to carnivores from the Kem Kem Group varied quite a bit, suggesting they were specialized to feed on different kinds of prey. This might have allowed the predators to stay out of each other’s way and avoid having to compete for the same meals. In many cases, these meals would have been seafood. Fish appear to have been the most plentiful food source at the time, with some of these swimmers reaching the size of SUVs.

In today’s landscapes, top predators such as wolves and lions are well outnumbered by their herbivorous prey. However, even during the mid-Cretaceous Period when northern Africa was covered by vast river systems, ecosystems dominated by so many bulky predators would have been rare. “In some ways it’s more similar to what you might see in marine ecosystems, where predators are actually more common,” Ibrahim says.

The landscape these animals lived in was filled with meandering rivers, lakes, and mudflats. This suggests that the region couldn’t support enough vegetation for long enough periods of time to feed large numbers of plant-eating dinosaurs, Ibrahim says.

However, there may be other reasons why paleontologists have found so few remnants of large herbivores in this area. Most of the sauropod fossils from this region are single bones or isolated fragments rather than more complete skeletons, which makes it hard to determine which species they belonged to, Philip Mannion, a paleontologist at University College London who was not involved in the research, said in an email. Sauropods also tend to have similar-looking teeth, and the vertebrae that would be more revealing are often fragile and less likely to be preserved.

“We can't ultimately be sure that [the fossils] don't reflect a greater diversity,” he said. It’s also possible that these plant-eating dinosaurs primarily lived and died in other nearby habitats and only rarely ventured into the areas that happened to be preserved in the Kem Kem Group.

For Ibrahim, the Kem Kem Group is a reminder that the ecosystems of the past could be governed by very different rules from those we see today. This isn’t surprising, he says, given that more than 99 percent of all organisms that ever existed died out before the little slice of time we call the present.

“The Sahara is a breathtaking place as it is, but when you’re out there in this dry and inhospitable place and you pick up giant fish scales and crocodile teeth, that really gives you a sense of what we call deep time,” he says. “That’s when you really understand how much our planet has and can change over time.”