Vertebrate paleontology is the scientific discipline within paleontology that focuses on the study of fossilized remains of vertebrate animals, including their morphology, systematics, evolutionary relationships, and paleoecology. It integrates anatomical analysis, comparative biology, stratigraphy, and geochronology to reconstruct the origin, diversification, and extinction patterns of vertebrates through deep time. Research in vertebrate paleontology often involves detailed examination of skeletal elements, functional morphology, and phylogenetic methods to infer evolutionary trajectories and biogeographic histories, as well as to interpret environmental and climatic conditions recorded in vertebrate fossil assemblages and associated sedimentary contexts.
Analysis of fossilized remains from dinosaurs known as troodontids reveals how one species' hip and leg bones may have developed over its lifespan, from embryo to adult—with potential implications for resolving longstanding ...
Paleontology & Fossils
Sep 9, 2026
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36
Scientists from the Denver Museum of Nature & Science and Liverpool John Moores University in England have discovered the first adult T. rex trackway, providing insights into how this emblematic predator moved. The findings ...
Paleontology & Fossils
Sep 9, 2026
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A broken rib from Scotty, the largest T. rex skeleton discovered, is helping scientists uncover new information about life on Earth 66 million years ago. Scotty's rib preserves something rarely seen in the fossil record: ...
Biotechnology
Sep 3, 2026
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155
As populations expanded in medieval England, key changes occurred in the uses of cattle and sheep to produce food and materials, according to a study published Sept. 2, 2026, in the journal PLOS One by Matilda Holmes of the ...
Paleontology & Fossils
Sep 2, 2026
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What did dinosaurs eat? Teeth provide important clues to understanding the ecology of dinosaurs, which became extinct approximately 66 million years ago. Their shape, structure and patterns of wear can help scientists reconstruct ...
Evolution
Aug 31, 2026
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Thirty-five years on—well, 12 million, technically—Ashfall Fossil Beds State Historical Park continues to offer important glimpses of prehistoric life in Nebraska.
Paleontology & Fossils
Aug 28, 2026
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The most prominent difference between human male and female skeletons is the pelvis, which anthropologists often use to determine the sex of ancient remains. Scientists have long believed the human pelvis evolved mainly as ...
Take a walk in London's Trafalgar Square this summer, and people of all body sizes—some tall, some short—will be wilting in the heat: a real mix of sizes.
Paleontology & Fossils
Aug 19, 2026
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South America was a frightening place during the Miocene. More than 10 million years ago, a vast lake covered much of the continent, home to giant turtles and crocodylians.
Ecology
Aug 16, 2026
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558
The closest living relatives of crocodiles and alligators are, perhaps surprisingly, birds. Both are archosauriforms, a group of species that originated about 250 million years ago near the beginning of the Triassic period.
Paleontology & Fossils
Aug 14, 2026
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