Wild Red by Simon Roy
Chinese Dinosaur Embryo Fossils Are Oldest Found So Far
The oldest fossilised dinosaur embryos found so far have been discovered by palaeontologists in China. With several of the embryos petrified at different stages of development, it offers a rare insight into exactly how dinosaurs developed inside eggs.
Also exciting is that the embryos appear to contain organic matter that hasn’t been fossilised, which would be the oldest organic material ever found from a terrestrial vertebrate. The fossils — which are thought to be either Massospondylus or Lufengosaurus — have been dated as being between 190 and 197 million years old, the Lower Jurassic period.Embryos can be difficult to study when fossilised because they tend to be inside eggs, but in this case more than 200 bones from several different animals were found among the remains of broken eggshells.
“The preservation of numerous disarticulated skeletal elements and eggshells in this monotaxic bone bed, representing different stages of incubation and therefore derived from different nests, provides opportunities for new investigations of dinosaur embryology in a clade noted for gigantism,” writes Robert Reisz, the study’s lead author.
Spectroscopic analysis of the bones also revealed the presence of preserved organic matter, the oldest so far found from a land-based vertebrate. The material — thought to be collagen — will be useful in determining the exact species of these embryos.
Both Massospondylus and Lufengosaurus are both sauropods, the clade of huge dinosaurs known for long necks and long tails. The most famous sauropod is probably Diplodocus. The embryos show a “consistently rapid rate of growth throughout development”, which could imply how all sauropods grew during the embryonic stage.
The findings have been published in Nature.
image: LufengosaurusJason Quinn/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 3.0
credit: Jason Quinn/ Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 3.0
(via thescienceofreality)
Mystery of Moon’s Magnetic Field Deepens
The moon generated a surprisingly intense magnetic field until at least 3.56 billion years ago, 160 million years longer than previously thought, a new study reports.
These findings could shed light not just on the magnetic field of the moon, which is now extremely weak, but on that of asteroids and other distant worlds, investigators added.
(via cozydark)
PACT
An open space where partnerships between like-minded businesses are housed. The clients’ different backgrounds in hairstyling, food and fashion, challenged the agency to create distinction amidst homogenising the brand experience.
Breast Milk May Defeat Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria
The fight against antibiotic resistance has gained an ally in breast milk. An ingredient found in human milk may make surface infections by the resistant bacteria MRSA more sensitive to attack by antibiotics, a team of researchers from the Univ. at Buffalo reports in the journal PLOS ONE.
The Univ. at Buffalo team added a protein complex – called HAMLET, after Human Alpha-lactalbumin Made LEthal to Tumor cells – purified from human milk to aggressive strains of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in Petri dishes and along the inside of the noses of mice. The researchers found that the bacteria were more responsive to antibiotics when they were used in combination with HAMLET.
Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news/2013/05/breast-milk-may-defeat-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria
Kelvinway and Havelock Street in the West End of Glasgow, Scotland, one morning last summer when there was a thick coat of fog covering the city.
(via stephen-edwards)
The connectivity of fiber tracks in alumnus Chris Gaiteri’s brain based on an imaging technique he created - a self-portrait of sorts.
Art in Science on Display at W&L’s Kamen Gallery (Washington and Lee University).
(via laboratoryequipment)
