Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

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Asher Hellbein @asherelbein.bsky.social · 11h

Prehistoric Planet season three has released its first clip, showing a family of North American ground sloths frolicking in the snowy landscape of the late Pleistocene.

Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age — Season 3 "Roll Around" Clip | Apple TV

YouTube video by Apple TV

www.youtube.com

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Adam P. Knave @adampknave.com · 7h

The secret to life? Easy. Don't be afraid to be sincere. Don't take yourself too seriously. Extend grace & kindness to kids who don't know the rules/how to be in society yet. Lift up your friends & loved ones every chance you get. Remember your best won't be 100% every day. That's basically it.

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Armin Reindl @arminreindl.bsky.social · 13h

INJECT IT STRAIGHT INTO MY VEINS HOLY SHIT YES YES YES
youtu.be/LJvbNKrukeQ?...

Prehistoric Planet: Ice Age - Official Season 3 First Look Clip (2025)

YouTube video by IGN

youtu.be

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Alex Stone @alexstoneart.bsky.social · 1d

The Ongoing Pest Problem at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Acrylic on Board

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Stieven @stievenvdp.bsky.social · 1d

Oh hey, it’s #PortfolioDay … again.

The less typical diorama stuff this time, annotated... and the thumbnails are going to suck.

Diorama featuring a bunch of wildlife that lived there, daytime scene

Diorama featuring a bunch of wildlife that lived there, nighttime scene.

Skorpiovenator diorama detailing nesting behaviour and some ontogony

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Mario Lanzas @mariolanzas.bsky.social · 1d

How our perception of Quetzalcoatlus changed over the decades #quetzalcoatlus #paleontology #paleoart

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Patrick Wyman @patrickwyman.bsky.social · 2d

My favorite aspect of the Columbus legend is him getting rejected by the Portuguese gets spun as them not recognizing the genius of his idea. No - he went into a roomful of expert navigators and made basic math mistakes, they thought he was a moron, and they wouldn't fund his idea on that basis.

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Caxela @caxela.bsky.social · 2d

Helveticosaurus Lair

A gathering of marine reptiles (Helveticosaurus zollingeri) lie on exposed rocks within a sea cave. Foamy sea water rushes in from the left, swirling beneath their perch.

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Emily Stepp @emilyart.bsky.social · 3d

#Paleoctober2025 day 11 and 12 paleoart sketches with the Precambrian microfossil Melanocyrillium and the Late Cretaceous antler-like crested pterosaur Nyctosaurus.

#Paleoctober #Paleoart #Melanocyrillium #Nyctosaurus

Close up of the microscopic vase-shaped cell.

Portrait of a brown with white spots Nyctosaurus with its beak pointing downward to the right and its long crest only visible toward the base with the rest going off screen. A rocky shore is in the background.

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Armin Reindl @arminreindl.bsky.social · 3d

#Croctober Day 12
Probably among the most obscure recently extinct crocodilians is Aldabrachampsus, a small (up to 2.5 meter) long animal of uncertain placement with a pair of rounded squamosal horns that lived on the Seychelles around 100.000 years ago

An illustratoin of Aldabrachampsus by paleoartist Manusuchus. The illustration shows the animal as similar to modern dwarf crocodiles with a short, blunt snout, interlocking teeth, large bulging eyes but different in having large, rounded horns above the ears.

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Karen Masters @karenlmasters.bsky.social · 4d

Jess Wade is amazing, and it's my absolute honour to be one of the more than 2000 women in STEM whose wikipedia page she started: mymodernmet.com/jessica-wade... 🧪🔭👩‍🔬

Meet the Physicist Who Wrote Over 2,000 Wikipedia Biographies for Women in STEM

After noticing a lack of entries on Wikipedia for incredible women throughout history, this incredible woman decided to take matters into her own hands.

mymodernmet.com

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Riley Black 🦕 🏳️‍⚧️ @restingdinoface.bsky.social · 4d

There are no carnivorous plants big enough to eat you, and there’s a good reason for that. Check out this piece I wrote for Smithsonian Magazine to learn why. 🌱

Riley Black 🦕 🏳️‍⚧️ @restingdinoface.bsky.social · 5d

It's part of why I wrote this piece, dipping into some of the pop culture aspects to highlight why carnivorous plants grow where they do. Amazing plants.

Carnivorous Plants Have Been Trapping Animals for Millions of Years. So Why Have They Never Grown Larger?

Plants that feed on meat and animal droppings have evolved at least ten times through evolutionary history

www.smithsonianmag.com

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Henry Thomas 🦤🏳️‍🌈 @zhejiang0pterus.bsky.social · 4d

Some of you might not like the design of my SVP poster this year. But there is no other way

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Henry Thomas 🦤🏳️‍🌈 @zhejiang0pterus.bsky.social · 5d

And that's not even getting into weird derived structures like the long scales of Longisquama and Mirasaura, Kulindadromeus's overlapping hexagon scales, the floppy back spikes of iguanas, etc. Tetrapod integument evolution is complex!

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Henry Thomas 🦤🏳️‍🌈 @zhejiang0pterus.bsky.social · 5d

Then there's the numerous scale morphologies on fish, which may or may not all be homologous with each other.

The relationships between each of these are still rather poorly understood, and when looking at fossil tetrapods we should be careful with which one is which

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Henry Thomas 🦤🏳️‍🌈 @zhejiang0pterus.bsky.social · 5d

We've got at least three types of scales in extant reptiles - dermal scales (maybe including croc scutes), epidermal scales of squamates, and bird foot scales, which are apparently secondarily derived from feathers. Plus the "scales" on rodent tails, pangolins, Castorocauda (some are hair-derived)

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Henry Thomas 🦤🏳️‍🌈 @zhejiang0pterus.bsky.social · 5d

Random unprompted reminder that there are a whole bunch of different anatomical structures in tetrapods that are colloquially referred to as "scales", and the properties of one don't necessarily apply to all of them

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Sophie M. @sophiesaurus98.bsky.social · 5d

Thinking about some lesser known Steve Kirk dinosaur artwork today. His work shaped my childhood perception of prehistoric life more than any other artist and I have an endless appreciation for his ability to decorate his animals in eye-catchingly beautiful patterns that look painted from life.

The dome-nosed head of Giraffatitan, a huge sauropod dinosaur, looms into frame. The scaly, lightly wrinkled skin is splotched with a blend of greens, grey, and yellows in a pattern reminiscent of crocodylians.

A group of vibrantly patterned "hypsilophodonts" forage amid the misty fern-coated floor of a Jurassic prairie. A herd of massive Diplodocus, sporting crests of iguana-like spines, pass in the middle distance. Far off, a brachiosaurid browses from towering conifers.

A sandy-toned, subtly striped Allosaurus with blue crests charges through a dusty clearing, jaws agape and hands flexing.

Portraits of Corythosaurus, Lambeosaurus, and Parasaurolophus, shown with earthy green, brown, and reddish tones in complex mottled patterns. Their keratin-sheathed crests are richly detailed, as are their scaly hides.

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Darren Naish @tetzoo.bsky.social · 5d

Today I attended The Colour of Dinosaurs at MAST Mayflower Studios in Southampton, a made-for-kids blend of science advocacy and theatre, with tons of music. It revolves around the work of Jakob Vinther, who plays himself, but also emphasises the diversity of its human cast and... cont

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Darren Naish @tetzoo.bsky.social · 6d

What did the dodo look like in life? A reminder of this Tet Zoo article from 2020, which pulls together most of the relevant sources and has influenced at least some recent depictions ... tetzoo.com/blog/2020/7/... #birds #extinct #Dodo

The Dodo in Life — Tetrapod Zoology

dodo, Dodos, Raphus, Raphus cucullatus, Raphidae, extinct birds, birds, ornithology, pigeons, dodobird, extinct bird, bird extinction, flightless birds, flightless pigeons, Erroll Fuller, Julian Hume,...

tetzoo.com

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SaurianCYH @sauriancyh.bsky.social · 7d

Rhamphorhynchus

Was intended to be just a sketch but I spent 2 or 3 too many weeks on it.
#paleoart #sciart

Ventral view of a Rhamphorhynchus flying under a bright blue sky, wings fully open, while looking down towards the pov.

Ventral view of a Rhamphorhynchus flying under a bright blue sky, wings fully open, while looking down towards the pov, zoomed in to the animal's head, torso and hindlimbs.

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Oakland Zoo @oaklandzoo.bsky.social · 8d

Here it is, the signature soundtrack of Oakland Zoo (sound UP 🎶)

Gibbons make these whooping sounds for many reasons -- to send an alert about predators, as mating calls, to announce their territory to neighbors, or to strengthen social bonding.

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emily moonlight @threnody.bsky.social · 8d

hi, cis folks in california!

this headline leaves out that newsom has another 5 days to sign these bills into law. if you’d like to tell him he should do that to protect trans californians, you should to reach out.

he also has a phone: (916) 445-2841

want to know what to say? next post! 🧵

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Mark Witton @markwitton.bsky.social · 9d

Preview of my latest #paleoart piece: a baby bison flees the deadliest predator of Ice Age Europe. Harrowing, harrowing stuff.

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Skye McDavid @skyemcdavid.com · 9d

Manuscript submitted - what @zhejiang0pterus.bsky.social and I initially thought would be a quick paper redescribing a handful of specimens but grew into 53 specimens, for which we traveled to 10 states plus DC... with some exciting implications.

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