Palæontologi

"As the co-discoverer of the first known burrowing dinosaur and a popular science author, Anthony J. Martin is an expert at explaining his fossil-finding work to broad audiences. In this engaging book, Martin uses modern and fossil traces to introduce readers to a menagerie of animals and other lifeforms that dig, crunch, bore, and otherwise reshape our planet. We meet elephants that dig ballroom-sized caves alongside volcanoes, parrotfishes that chew coral reefs and poop out sandy beaches, dinosaur-eating crocodiles, and moon snails that drill into clams, or even other moon snails. In a detective story that spans millions of years, ranging from microbes to whales, Martin shows how when life got hard, life got boring, using bodies and behavior to hide, eat, attack, and defend, affecting both our world and our understanding of evolution, climate, and life itself"--

New from the author of the acclaimed bestseller The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs (?A masterpiece of science writing.? ?Washington Post) and ?one of the stars of modern paleontology? (National Geographic), a sweeping and revelatory history of mammals, illuminating the lost story of the extraordinary family tree that led to us.We humans are the inheritors of a dynasty that has reigned over the planet for nearly 66 million years, through fiery cataclysm and ice ages: the mammals. Our lineage includes saber-toothed tigers, woolly mammoths, armadillos the size of a car, cave bears three times the weight of a grizzly, clever scurriers that outlasted Tyrannosaurus rex, and even other types of humans, like Neanderthals. Indeed humankind and many of the beloved fellow mammals we share the planet with today?lions, whales, dogs?represent only the few survivors of a sprawling and astonishing family tree that has been pruned by time and mass extinctions. How did we get here?In his acclaimed bestseller The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs?hailed as ?the ultimate dinosaur biography? by Scientific American?American paleontologist Steve Brusatte enchanted readers with his definitive history of the dinosaurs. Now, picking up the narrative in the ashes of the extinction event that doomed T-rex and its kind, Brusatte explores the remarkable story of the family of animals that inherited the Earth?mammals? and brilliantly reveals that their story is every bit as fascinating and complex as that of the dinosaurs.Beginning with the earliest days of our lineage some 325 million years ago, Brusatte charts how mammals survived the asteroid that claimed the dinosaurs and made the world their own, becoming the astonishingly diverse range of animals that dominate today's Earth. Brusatte also brings alive the lost worlds mammals inhabited through time, from ice ages to volcanic catastrophes. Entwined in this story is the detective work he and other scientists have done to piece together our understanding using fossil clues and cutting-edge technology.A sterling example of scientific storytelling by one of our finest young researchers, The Rise and Reign of the Mammals illustrates how this incredible history laid the foundation for today's world, for us, and our future.

Går man ude i den danske natur, specielt ved stranden og i grusgravene, vader man i flintsten. Går man på en grusbelagt plads, består en væsentlig del af gruset af flint. Så flint udgør en del af hverdagen her i Danmark.Arkæologerne og historikerne er meget interesseret i flint, specielt de der arbejder med oldtiden, hvor mennesket brugte flint til en stor del af deres værktøj og våben. Der findes derfor flere bøger med beskrivelse af flint, flintredskaber og fremstillingen af flintredskaber, men de mangler et bredere geologisk fundament for forståelsen af flints dannelse. Den side af sagen er kun skitseret.

This volume details the function of hydrocarbon seeps, their evolution over time, the most important seep occurrences and the fauna present in ancient hydrocarbon seeps. While several publications exist that cover modern seeps and vents, fossil seeps only constitute a small component of the literature. As such, many geologists, stratigraphers and paleontologists, as well as undergraduates and graduate students, are not very familiar with ancient hydrocarbon seep deposits and their associated fauna. This text is the first to comprehensively discuss the nature of such animal groups and how to recognize them. In addition to summarizing available knowledge on these topics for specialists in the field, this book offers the background needed to be of use to students as well as the wider community of geologists and paleontologists.