The recent discovery of diverse fossil flowers and floral organs in Cretaceous strata has revealed astonishing details about the structural and systematic diversity of early angiosperms. Exploring the rich fossil record that has accumulated over the last three decades, this is a unique study of the evolutionary history of flowering plants from their earliest phases in obscurity to their dominance in modern vegetation. The discussion provides comprehensive biological and geological background information, before moving on to summarise the fossil record in detail. Including previously unpublished results based on research into Early and Late Cretaceous fossil floras from Europe and North America, the authors draw on direct palaeontological evidence of the pattern of angiosperm evolution through time. Synthesising palaeobotanical data with information from living plants, this unique book explores the latest research in the field, highlighting connections with phylogenetic systematics, structure and the biology of extant angiosperms.

Only recently was it determined that two of the world's most devastating plagues, the plague of Justinian and the medieval Black Death, were caused by distinct strains of the same pathogen. Use of paleomicrobiological techniques led to this discovery. This work is just one example of the historical mysteries that this emerging field has helped to clarify. Others, such as when tuberculosis began to afflict humans, the role of lice in plague pandemics, and the history of smallpox, are explored and further illuminated in Paleomicrobiology of Humans. Led by editors Michel Drancourt and Didier Raoult, the book's expert contributors address larger issues using paleomicrobiology. These include the recognition of human remains associated with epidemic outbreaks, identification of the graves of disasters, and the discovery of demographic structures that reveal the presence of an epidemic moment. In addition, the book reviews the technical approaches and controversies associated with recovering and sequencing very old DNA and surveys modern human diseases that have ancient roots. Essentially, paleomicrobiologists aim to identify past epidemics at the crossroads of different specialties, including anthropology, medicine, molecular biology, and microbiology. Thus, this book is of great interest not only to microbiologists but to medical historians and anthropologists as well. Paleomicrobiology of Humans is the first comprehensive book to examine so many aspects of this new, multidisciplinary, scientific field.

It is not often that a work can literally rewrite a person's view of a subject. And this is exactly what Rudwick's book should do for many paleontologists' view of the history of their own field.--Stephen J. Gould, Paleobotany and Palynology Rudwick has not merely written the first book-length history of palaeontology in the English language; he has written a very intelligent one. . . . His accounts of sources are rounded and organic: he treats the structure of arguments as Cuvier handled fossil bones.--Roy S. Porter, History of Science

In growing numbers, archeologists are specializing in the analysis of excavated animal bones as clues to the environment and behavior of ancient peoples. This pathbreaking work provides a detailed discussion of the outstanding issues and methods of bone studies that will interest zooarcheologists as well as paleontologists who focus on reconstructing ecologies from bones. Because large samples of bones from archeological sites require tedious and time-consuming analysis, the authors also offer a set of computer programs that will greatly simplify the bone specialist's job.
After setting forth the interpretive framework that governs their use of numbers in faunal analysis, Richard G. Klein and Kathryn Cruz-Uribe survey various measures of taxonomic abundance, review methods for estimating the sex and age composition of a fossil species sample, and then give examples to show how these measures and sex/age profiles can provide useful information about the past. In the second part of their book, the authors present the computer programs used to calculate and analyze each numerical measure or count discussed in the earlier chapters. These elegant and original programs, written in BASIC, can easily be used by anyone with a microcomputer or with access to large mainframe computers.

This book provides an important reference guide to pollen and spore identification for Chinese Quaternary palynological studies. Presenting and describing more than 400 color photomicrographs of pollen grains and spores retrieved from sediments in China, it offers a unique asset for researchers, graduate students, and newcomers to the field of Quaternary palynology, which constitutes a major aspect of Quaternary paleoecology, paleoclimatology, and paleogeography.

Studies of the Jurassic period are greatly helped by the high degree of stratigraphic control provided by the ubiquitous ammonites. Although this work, originally publisjed in 1975, is not a study of stratigraphy as such, a short chapter on this topic is included to provide a framework for environmental interpretation. The main goal of this book is to review in detail the advances which existed at the time in the interpretation of Jurassic facies in the classical European and American deposits and to then apply this knowledge to illuminate more general topics such as the fluctuation in land/sea distribution and the nature of the Jurassic climate and biogeography. There is also an account of plate tectonics and igneous activity during the period. A comprehensive bibliography is provided, which includes the important stratigraphic literature published from 1956 to 1975.

This book simulates a historical walk through nature, teaching readers about the biodiversity on Earth in various eras with a focus on past terrestrial environments. Geared towards a student audience, using simple terms and avoiding long complex explanations, the book discusses the plants and animals that lived on land, the evolution of natural systems, and how these biological systems changed over time in geological and paleontological contexts. With easy-to-understand and scientifically accurate and up-to-date information, readers will be guided through major biological events from the Earth's past. The topics in the book represent a broad paleoenvironmental spectrum of interests and educational modules, allowing for virtual visits to rich geological times. Eras and events that are discussed include, but are not limited to, the much varied Quaternary environments, the evolution of plants and animals during the Cenozoic, the rise of angiosperms, vertebrate evolution and ecosystems in the Mesozoic, the Permian mass extinction, the late Paleozoic glaciation, and the origin of the first trees and land plants in the Devonian-Ordovician. With state-of-the art expert scientific instruction on these topics and up-to-date and scientifically accurate illustrations, this book can serve as an international course for students, teachers, and other interested individuals.

This book is the most authoritative encyclopedia ever prepared on dinosaurs and dinosaur science. In addition to entries on specific animals such as "Tyrannosaurus, Triceratops," and "Velociraptor," the Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs covers reproduction, behavior, physiology, and extinction. The book is generously illustrated with many detailed drawings and photographs, and includes color pictures and illustrations that feature interpretations of the best known and most important animals. All alphabetical entries are cross-referenced internally, as well as at the end of each entry. The Encyclopedia includes up-to-date references that encourage the reader to investigate personal interests.
Key Features
* The most authoritative encyclopedia ever prepared on dinosaurs
* Includes many detailed drawings, photographs and illustrations in both color and black-and-white
* Contains comprehensively cross-referenced alphabetical entries with internal references, as well as references at the conclusion of each entry
* Provides in-depth references, allowing readers to pursue independent interests
* Includes sixteen plates and 35 color illustrations

From the outback of Australia to the Gobi Desert of Mongolia and the savanna of Madagascar, the award-winning science writer and dinosaur enthusiast John Pickrell embarks on a world tour of new finds, meeting the fossil hunters who work at the frontier of discovery. He reveals the dwarf dinosaurs unearthed by an eccentric Transylvanian baron; an aquatic, crocodile-snouted carnivore bigger than T. rex that once lurked in North African waterways; a Chinese dinosaur with wings like a bat; and a Patagonian sauropod so enormous it weighed more than two commercial jet airliners. Other surprising discoveries hail from Alaska, Siberia, Canada, Burma, and South Africa. Why did dinosaurs grow so huge? How did they spread across the world? Did they all have feathers? What do sauropods have in common with 1950s vacuum cleaners? The stuff of adventure movies and scientific revolutions, Weird Dinosaurs examines the latest breakthroughs and new technologies that are radically transforming our understanding of the distant past. Pickrell opens a vivid portal to a brand-new age of fossil discovery, in which fossil hunters are routinely redefining what we know and how we think about prehistory's most iconic and fascinating creatures.

Vertebrate evolution has led to the convergent appearance of many groups of originally terrestrial animals that now live in the sea. Among these groups are familiar mammals like whales, dolphins, and seals. There are also reptilian lineages (like plesiosaurs, ichthyosaurs, mosasaurs, thalattosaurs, and others) that have become sea creatures. Most of these marine reptiles, often wrongly called "dinosaurs," are extinct. This edited book is devoted to these extinct groups of marine reptiles. These reptilian analogs represent useful models of the myriad adaptations that permit tetrapods to live in the ocean.
Key Features
* First book in more than 80 years devoted exclusively to fossil marine reptiles
* Documents the most current research on extinct marine reptiles
* Prepared by the world's most prominent experts in the field
* Well illustrated

Picture a world of dog-sized scorpions and millipedes as long as a car; tropical rainforests with trees towering over 150 feet into the sky and a giant polar continent five times larger than Antarctica. That world was not imaginary; it was the earth more than 300 million years ago in the Carboniferous period of the Paleozoic era. In Carboniferous Giants and Mass Extinction, George R. McGhee Jr. explores that ancient world, explaining its origins; its downfall in the end-Permian mass extinction, the greatest biodiversity crisis to occur since the evolution of animal life on Earth; and how its legacies still affect us today. McGhee investigates the consequences of the Late Paleozoic ice age in this comprehensive portrait of the effects of ancient climate change on global ecology. Carboniferous Giants and Mass Extinction examines the climatic conditions that allowed for the evolution of gigantic animals and the formation of the largest tropical rainforests ever to exist, which in time turned into the coal that made the industrial revolution possible-and fuels the engine of contemporary anthropogenic climate change. Exploring the strange and fascinating flora and fauna of the Late Paleozoic ice age world, McGhee focuses his analysis on the forces that brought this world to an abrupt and violent end. Synthesizing decades of research and new discoveries, this comprehensive book provides a wealth of insights into past and present extinction events and climate change.

Quantitative Paleozoology describes and illustrates how the remains of long-dead animals recovered from archaeological and paleontological excavations can be studied and analyzed. The methods range from determining how many animals of each species are represented to determining whether one collection consists of more broken and more burned bones than another. All methods are described and illustrated with data from real collections, while numerous graphs illustrate various quantitative properties.

This book broadens the reader's knowledge base on lithofacies distribution, facies succession and association, and interpretation of paleo-depositional environments using outcrop-based and measured sedimentologic section data integrated with facies and petrographic analyses. Besides, the author also provides step-bystep workflow that could guide detailed geological field mapping and improve outcrop studies across Middle-Upper Cretaceous (Cenomanian-Campanian) successions of Southern Benue Trough and the lower stratigraphic interval of Anambra Basin, outcropping in Afikpo area of Southeastern Nigeria.

This book discusses the Lagoa Santa Karst, which has been internationally known since the pioneering studies of the Danish naturalist Peter Lund in the early 1800s. It covers the speleogenesis, geology, vegetation, fauna, hydrogeology, geomorphology, and anthropogenic use of the Lagoa Santa Karst and is the first English-language book on this major karst area. The area, which has been at the heart of the debate on the origin and age of human colonization in the Americas, is characterized by a classical and scenic karst landscape with limestone cliffs, karst lakes and karst plains, in addition to numerous solution dolines. More than 1,000 caves have been documented in the area, many with significant archeological and paleontological value. Despite its great importance, the Lagoa Santa Karst faces severe environmental threats due to limestone mining and the expansion of the metropolis of Belo Horizonte and its surrounding towns. The growing recognition of the area's remarkable significance has led to increasing concern, and a number of protected areas have now been established, improving the conservation status of this landmark karst area.

Donald R. Prothero's Evolution is an entertaining and rigorous history of the transitional forms and series found in the the fossil record. Its engaging narrative of scientific discovery and well-grounded analysis has led to the book's widespread adoption in courses that teach the nature and value of fossil evidence. Evolution tackles flood geology, rock dating, neo-Darwinism, and macroevolution. It includes extensive coverage of the primordial soup, invertebrate transitions, the development of the backbone, the reign of the dinosaurs, and the transformation from chimpanzee to human. The book details the many "missing links," including some of the most recent discoveries, that flesh out the fossil timeline and the evolutionary process. In this second edition, Prothero describes new transitional fossils from various periods, vividly depicting such bizarre creatures as the Odontochelys, or the "turtle on the half shell," fossil snakes with legs, and the "Frogamander," a new example of amphibian transition. Prothero's discussion of intelligent-design arguments includes more historical examples and careful examination of the "experiments" and observations that are exploited by creationists seeking to undermine sound science education. With new perspectives, Prothero reframes creationism more as a case study in denialism and pseudoscience than as a field with its own intellectual dynamism. The first edition was hailed as the best book on the fossil evidence for evolution, and this second edition will be welcome in the libraries of scholars, teachers, and general readers who stand up for sound science.

Although herbivory probably first appeared over 300 million years ago, it only became established as a common feeding strategy during Late Permian times. Subsequently, herbivory evolved in numerous lineages of terrestrial vertebrates, and the acquisition of this mode of feeding was frequently associated with considerable evolutionary diversification in those lineages. This book, originally published in 2000, represented the first comprehensive overview of the evolution of herbivory in land-dwelling amniote tetrapods in recent years. In Evolution of Herbivory in Terrestrial Vertebrates leading experts review the structural adaptations for, and the evolutionary history of, feeding on plants in the major groups of land-dwelling vertebrates, especially dinosaurs and ungulate mammals. As such it will be the definitive reference source on this topic for evolutionary biologists and vertebrate paleontologists alike.

Fish, or lower vertebrates, occupy the basal nodes of the vertebrate phylogeny, and are therefore crucial in interpreting almost every feature of more advanced vertebrates, including amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. Recent research focuses on combining evolutionary observations - primarily from the fish fossil record - with developmental data from living fishes, in order to better interpret evolutionary history and vertebrate phylogeny. This book highlights the importance of this research in the interpretation of vertebrate evolution, bringing together world-class palaeontologists and biologists to summarise the most interesting, current and cutting-edge topics in fish evolution and development. It will be an invaluable tool for researchers in early vertebrate palaeontology and evolution, and those particularly interested in the interface between evolution and development.

The assassin's bullet misses, the Archduke's carriage moves forward, and a catastrophic war is avoided. So too with the history of life. Re-run the tape of life, as Stephen J. Gould claimed, and the outcome must be entirely different: an alien world, without humans and maybe not even intelligence. The history of life is littered with accidents: any twist or turn may lead to a completely different world. Now this view is being challenged. Simon Conway Morris explores the evidence demonstrating life's almost eerie ability to navigate to a single solution, repeatedly. Eyes, brains, tools, even culture: all are very much on the cards. So if these are all evolutionary inevitabilities, where are our counterparts across the galaxy? The tape of life can only run on a suitable planet, and it seems that such Earth-like planets may be much rarer than hoped. Inevitable humans, yes, but in a lonely Universe.

This Open Access book introduces readers to the regional geology of Hanggai, Xianxia and Chuancun, the area between China's northern Zhejiang Province and southern Anhui Province and explores the strata, magmatic rocks and tectonic structures in 1:50,000 scale geological maps. Based on studies of multiple stratigraphic divisions, the standard stratigraphic section of the upper Ordovician Hirnantian in the lower Yangtze region is established, revealing for the first time numerous "Burgess Shale-type" sponge fossils in Hirnantian strata and identifying 10 grapholite fossil belts and various fossil categories, including chitin, trilobites, gastropods, brachiopods, and cephalopods. Moreover, the book identifies for the first time Late Ordovician volcanic events in northern Zhejiang province. The work represents a major contribution to research on Paleozoic strata in the Lower Yangtze region, and sheds new light on understanding the Hirnantian glacial event and biological extinction event in South China by providing a high-precision time scale. In addition, the book opens an important avenue for future research on sponge evolution after the Cambrian life explosion. As such, it offers a unique and valuable asset for researchers and graduate students alike.

Human life, and how we came to be, is one of the greatest scientific and philosophical questions of our time. This compact and accessible book presents a modern view of human evolution. Written by a leading authority, it lucidly and engagingly explains not only the evolutionary process, but the technologies currently used to unravel the evolutionary past and emergence of Homo sapiens. By separating the history of palaeoanthropology from current interpretation of the human fossil record, it lays numerous misconceptions to rest, and demonstrates that human evolution has been far from the linear struggle from primitiveness to perfection that we've been led to believe. It also presents a coherent scenario for how Homo sapiens contrived to cross a formidable cognitive barrier to become an extraordinary and unprecedented thinking creature. Elegantly illustrated, Understanding Human Evolution is for anyone interested in the complex and tangled story of how we came to be.

The assassin's bullet misses, the Archduke's carriage moves forward, and a catastrophic war is avoided. So too with the history of life. Re-run the tape of life, as Stephen J. Gould claimed, and the outcome must be entirely different: an alien world, without humans and maybe not even intelligence. The history of life is littered with accidents and any twist or turn may lead to a completely different world. Now this view is challenged in Simon Conway Morris' exploration of the evidence demonstrating life's almost eerie ability to repeatedly navigate towards a single solution. Are all evolutionary inevitabilities limited to the suitability of a planet? Where are our counterparts across the galaxy? If the tape of life can only run on a suitable planet, it seems that such Earth-like planets are much rarer than hoped, and we remain inevitably humans in a lonely Universe. Simon Conway Morris is the Ad Hominen Professor in the Earth Science Department at the University of Cambridge. Morris is also a fellow of St. John's College and the Royal Society. His research focuses on the study of the constraints on evolution, and the historical processes that lead to the emergence of complexity, especially with respect to the construction of the major animal body plans in the Cambrian explosion. His work is central to palaeobiology, but is also of great interest to molecular biologists and bioastronomers. Previous published works include The Crucible of Creation: Burgess Shale and the Rise of Animals (Getty Center for Education in the Arts, 1999); and co-author of Solnhofen (Cambridge, 1990).

Illustrating the concepts, methods, and applications of computer-assisted virtual reconstruction

Virtual Reconstruction demonstrates how readers can transform organisms from physical reality into virtual reality. Specifically, the authors provide the knowledge and tools needed to enable researchers to reconstruct fragmented and distorted fossil specimens in 3-D images so that their function, biomechanics, developmental changes, and evolutionary modifications can be determined. Likewise, the authors demonstrate how the same 3-D techniques can be used to enhance medical diagnosis and permit detailed planning of surgical intervention and forensic reconstruction on the basis of patient-specific anatomical data. They also provide a thorough introduction into modern methods of 3-D geometric-morphometric analysis.

All the steps of 3-D reconstruction are covered in detail, including data acquisition, processing, graphical representation, interactive manipulation, morphometric analysis, and rapid prototyping. Helping readers to bridge the gap between theory and practice, the authors have taken a four-pronged approach to their subject: The main text introduces basic concepts, provides technical information, presents practical applications, and discusses potential issues for further research Feature boxes offer schematic diagrams to simplify difficult concepts and case studies that demonstrate how concepts and methods are applied in real-world situations Appendices contain classical linear algebra formulation as well as standard data formats for text, standard images, biomedical images, and graphical objects Companion Internet site allows readers to experiment with sample data sets andapplets and provides links to tutorials, applets, databases, and technical definitions: www.wiley.com/go/virtualreconstruction

The two authors are internationally recognized as leaders and innovators in their field. Their text reflects more than a decade of research in computer-assisted paleoanthropology as well as their insightful lectures and courses in biomedical imaging, scientific visualization, and computational morphology.

This is the only reference that introduces readers, in the biosciences, to the concepts, methods, and applications of computer-assisted virtual reconstruction. It is an invaluable resource for researchers in physical anthropology, paleontology, morphology, anatomy, medicine, forensics, and primatology. Surgeons will find this book a reliable and state-of-the-art information source. Furthermore, the text is an excellent reference for computer scientists working in the biosciences.

This volume combines 10 years of accomplished research at the Pilauco site. The studies are focused on a variety of scientific areas including geological, sedimentological, geomorphological and paleobotanical topics, as well as paleontology of vertebrata and invertebrata, micropaleontology, archaeology, biochemistry, taxonomy, taphonomy, astrophysics and the development of some particular touristic aspects. In 18 chapters a variety of authors describe the excavation and investigation of this unique location. The book presents Pilauco as an example for the natural laboratory which can be found in South America, a testing ground for many of the hypotheses regarding migrations of animals and humans. In this context the study of topics, such as the paleozoography, the role of megafauna species for the architecture of the forests, the animal extinctions or the early human settlements, is extremely important on a global scale. The Pilauco site features paleontological and archaeological evidences and is contemporaneous with the Monte Verde site (~ 15,000 cal. yr AP). It is located 100 km north from Monte Verde and lies within the Intermediate Depression in northwestern Chilean Patagonia. It was discovered by chance in 1986 and has been excavated and investigated since 2007.