Luister naar Terrible Lizards

This time out we are joined by palaeontologist Andre Rowe to talk about his research into the skulls of giant carnivorous dinosaurs and what this means for their biology. This turns into a debate with Dave about how evidence can be interpreted in different ways and trying to piece together the often limited data we have to work out what these animals might have been doing. Though with her media-trained eye, Iszi wants to badge this as a heated fight over just how awesome Tyrannosaurus was (see previous episode for details). Andre takes us through the process of scanning skulls, restoring the bits and then testing ideas about bite force and skull strength and how the different giant theropod differed in their habits. Links: Support us on patreon and get extra content: www.patreon.com/terriblelizards [https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards] Here’s an article Andre wrote on his T. rex bite research: https://theconversation.com/tyrannosaurus-rex-didnt-get-its-ferocious-bite-until-it-was-an-adult-new-research-156668 Here is Andre’s Instagram handle: @tyrannosaurrowe

This month’s episode is a sort of follow-up to that from the start of the year, looking at some of the more problematic areas of dinosaurs and palaeontology when it comes to online discussions. There is an online fandom of dinosaurs that treats them like monsters or superheroes, and can fixate on what is and isn’t the biggest / strongest / fastest dinosaur and who could beat up who. Joining us to discuss this is Dr Mike O’Sullivan, a palaeontologist and self-professed member of several fandoms. We talk about how this community works and what it means for scientists talking about research.   Links: Support us on Patreon: www.patreon.com/terriblelizards   Mike is part of Palaeogames, a company of professional palaeontologists making accurate books and games: https://palaeogames.com/ [https://palaeogames.com/]   And here’s their latest Kickstarter, a Dungeons & Dragons companion book: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/palaeogames/professor-primulas-portfolio-of-palaeontology [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/palaeogames/professor-primulas-portfolio-of-palaeontology]

Series 11, eh? We don’t think we, or anyone else reading this, expected that. Nor did we expect issues with Dave’s microphone (apologies)… Still, here we are and with more dinosaur goodness coming. We say ‘coming’ because this episode is far less about dinosaurs and pterosaurs than usual, but more about the mechanisms of science. In this case it’s really about Dave’s experiences as a science communicator and how things like this are increasingly important for science, but in the UK at least, this can be monitored and measured and so having ways to do that becomes important. And this is the central point of today’s show, a call to arms for all those who are involved in sci comms and delight in sharing new knowledge to understand why it’s important to credit your sources when new discoveries are made.   Links: For extra content: patreon.com/terriblelizards [https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards] If you want to know a bit more about REF in the UK, here’s the main pages for it: https://2029.ref.ac.uk/about/what-is-the-ref/ [https://2029.ref.ac.uk/about/what-is-the-ref/] And if we’re talking communication, it seems a good time to say that Iszi and Dave are both now on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/davehone.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/davehone.bsky.social] https://bsky.app/profile/iszi.com [https://bsky.app/profile/iszi.com]

Thanks to Kyle, Tom, Ashley, Aurous, Wayne, Paleo Pete, Tyler, Will, Israel, Charles, James and Edward Support us on patreon.com/terriblelizards and be rewarded with extra content! We are planning on going live on isztube at 16:00 GMT on Friday 26th December. (Time may change)

Skiphosoura – the pterosaur of the gaps So last week Dave had a new paper out and this time it’s a new pterosaur, named Skiphosoura bavarica (the sword tail of Bavaria) and it is both really interesting and really important for pterosaur research. It tells us a lot about the key transition of pterosaurs from the early forms through to the derived pterodactyloids, which has been a major subject of research for the last 15 years. Skiphosaura also shows us that the Scottish Dearc (that we covered a couple of years back) is much more important than previously thought and helps create a fantastic series of species where we can now track a whole series of evolutionary steps for pterosaurs. This transition really is now a great example of being able to see an evolutionary change over time in the fossil record. So strap in for some overly-detailed anatomical descriptions of bits of obscure pterosaurs! Links: Support us on patreon and get extra content https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards [https://www.patreon.com/terriblelizards] Here’s a link to the full paper – it’s open access so anyone can read it: https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(24)01377-0 [https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(24)01377-0]   And here’s Dave’s blog post about the specimen and it’s significance: https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2024/11/18/skiphosoura-solving-the-transition-to-pterodactyloids/ [https://archosaurmusings.wordpress.com/2024/11/18/skiphosoura-solving-the-transition-to-pterodactyloids/]   Link to the website of the Lauer Foundation: https://www.lauerfoundationpse.org/ [https://www.lauerfoundationpse.org/]   The bonus episode we did on Dearc: https://terriblelizards.libsyn.com/tls06-bonus-jurassic-pterosaur-dearc-sgiathanach [https://terriblelizards.libsyn.com/tls06-bonus-jurassic-pterosaur-dearc-sgiathanach]