Droughts across north Texas dried the Paluxy River bed, famous for its dinosaur footprints. Ordinarily, the dinosaur tracks lie buried beneath water-covered mud, but dry conditions enabled workers to remove the mire that had long covered them at Dinosaur Valley State Park near Glen Rose.

Now this is exciting: “Geologists have found the fossil of the earliest known animal predator. The 560-million-year-old specimen is the first of its kind, but it is related to a group of animals that includes corals, jellyfish and [sea] anemones living on the planet today.”¹

Once again, a recent and remarkable fossil discovery has been made challenging evolutionary theory. A strange arthropod (i.e. a radiodont) has been found in the Cambrian strata of the geologic column.

Jeremy DeSilva of Dartmouth College gave an evening presentation at the end of this year’s week-long American Society of Mass Spectrometry conference. As a human fossil expert, DeSilva’s lecture discussed a different topic than what these engineering-oriented scientists typically study. Whether technician or homemaker, everyone wants to understand more about where we all came from.

Plesiosaurs (“near lizards”) were an amazing group of aquatic reptiles. Their clear design includes unique flippers and streamlined bodies with long necks.