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26+ min ago (413+ words) The Pachycephalosaurus skull belonged to a dinosaur with a domed-shaped head that lived around 67 million years ago The Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History says it will display a rare and "remarkable" dinosaur skull that was unearthed in South Dakota. The well-preserved Pachycephalosaurus skull was found in rocks of the Hell Creek Formation in 2024. The dinosaur, known for its domed-shaped head, walked the earth around 67 million years ago. "This skull is by far the most spectacular specimen of this type of dinosaur that we have at the museum," paleontologist Matthew Carrano, the museum's curator of Dinosauria, said in a statement. "We almost never get to see the animal's face or the teeth or other parts of the head because they usually have broken away." The fossil contains 32 different cranial bones and many of the dinosaur's teeth, including some teeth that…...

37+ min ago (431+ words) December 11, 2025 / 10:28 PM CST / CBS Texas Dinosaur Valley State Park draws thousands of visitors each year to see some of the best-preserved dinosaur tracks in the world. But some locals fear that view could soon include something far more modern: towering high-voltage power lines. At the park, the ancient tracks are embedded in limestone along the Paluxy River " footprints millions of years old that leaders say define the town. "This is limestone the dinosaurs actually walked on," Mayor Joe Boles added. "You can see the claw marks. You can see the footprints." Boles says the prints are central to Glen Rose's identity. "You don't have dinosaur prints in Texas," he said. "That's why Glen Rose is known as the dinosaur capital of Texas." But a proposed Oncor project could one day bring 200-foot transmission towers into view near the park. "And…...

1+ hour, 14+ min ago (79+ words) Hey! I'm trying to find a picture I've seen online, originally from an artist on Bluesky. The picture is a black-and-white line cartoon of a bearded centaur and a horse, in two panels. In one panel the centaur is astride the horse in a vertical mount, two hooves in stirrups. In the second, the centaur is astride the horse with all four feet in the stirrups. Thanks! Picture of a centaur riding a horse in two ways...

1+ hour, 15+ min ago (307+ words) December 11, 2025, 5:51 PM The Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History has received a gift that will be hard to outdo this holiday season " a nearly complete dinosaur skull. It's a gift that will keep on giving, as the public has a chance to see the approximately 67-million-year-old fossil from Dec. 22 to Dec. 28 (minus Christmas Day, when the museum is closed). Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, and his wife Wendy purchased and donated the "remarkably complete" skull of Pachycephalosaurus, a dinosaur the Smithsonian said is famed for its domed head. The species roamed the earth alongside the most renowned dinosaurs, such as the Tyrannosaurus rex and Triceratops, at the end of the Cretaceous Period. The skull will make its temporary debut at the museum before it joins the permanent fossil exhibition in the coming years, the Smithsonian said in a…...

1+ hour, 30+ min ago (576+ words) Legend once had it that the huge, three-toed footprints scattered across the central highlands of Bolivia came from supernaturally strong monsters " capable of sinking their claws even into solid stone. Then scientists came here in the 1960s and dispelled children's fears, determining that the strange footprints in fact belonged to gigantic, two-legged dinosaurs that stomped and splashed over 60 million years ago, in the ancient waterways of what is now Toro Toro, a village and popular national park in the Bolivian Andes. "There's no place in the world where you have such a big abundance of (theropod) footprints," said Roberto Biaggi, a co-author of the study led by Spanish paleontologist Ra'l Esperante. "We have all these world records at this particular site." The dinosaurs that ruled the earth and roamed this region also made awkward attempts to swim here, according to the…...

4+ hour, 6+ min ago (184+ words) Published Dec 11, 2025 8:00 PM EST Nearly 70 million years ago, mosasaurs were the stuff of nightmares. Multiple species of the apex marine reptiles lived during the Late Cretaceous, often growing anywhere from 30 to 40 feet-long. But as dangerous as the ancient, great white shark-sized were for their prehistoric ocean prey, paleontologists have long assumed mosasaurs stuck to saltwater. A tooth recently found in the famous Hell Creek formation in Montana suggests otherwise. According to findings published on December 11 in the journal BMC Zoology, at least one mosasaur species may have pursued their meals upstream into freshwater rivers. Hell Creek includes some of the world's most diverse troves of Upper Cretaceous and lower Paleocene fossils. In addition to land dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurs and Triceratops, the region was also home to aquatic species like mosasaurs. While nowhere near an ocean today, the area included rivers…...

4+ hour, 6+ min ago (532+ words) Mosasaurs, the iconic giant marine reptiles thought exclusively to be masters of the ancient oceans, actually adapted to live in freshwater rivers. Some 66 million years ago, a city bus-sized terrifying predator prowled a prehistoric river in what is now North Dakota." This finding is based on the analysis of a single mosasaur tooth conducted by an international team of researchers from the United States, Sweden, and the Netherlands." The tooth came from a prognathodontine mosasaur " a reptile reaching up to 11 meters long. This makes it an apex predator on par with the largest killer whales. It shows that massive mosasaurs successfully adapted to life in rivers right up until their extinction. Dating from 98 to 66 million years ago, abundant mosasaur fossils have been uncovered in marine deposits across North America, Europe, and Africa. However, these marine reptile fossils have been rarely…...

6+ hour, 57+ min ago (660+ words) Matthew Carrano gently ran his finger along the toothy upper jaw of the Smithsonian Institution's newest arrival, which was still sitting in its padded shipping crate. The dinosaur curator looked down in awe at the hulking 67-million-year-old fossil with jumbo eye sockets and knobby protrusions that he hopes will change humanity's understanding of a baffling, lost creature. Over the summer, scientists at the National Museum of Natural History acquired the rare and remarkably preserved Pachycephalosaurus skull. On Thursday, researchers announced they are getting ready for the public to view it, at least for a few days. Pachycephalosaurus means "thickheaded lizard," which is something of an understatement. Researchers speak lovingly of the bowling ball-esque dome topping its head, and hope to help figure out how that bit of anatomy relates to its behavior. Was that thick head for ramming and settling…...

7+ hour, 26+ min ago (413+ words) Learn how chemical clues reveal a mosasaur was hunting in freshwater rivers as the Cretaceous seaway receded. For decades, mosasaurs have been understood as among the dominant predators of the Cretaceous seas " marine reptiles that could reach 11 meters in length and patrol the waters of the Western Interior Seaway. But a new analysis of a tooth from North Dakota suggests that at least one lineage didn't remain confined to the sea. To understand how a marine reptile ended up in a river deposit, the team compared the mosasaur tooth with nearby fossils of similar age. At Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, they analyzed oxygen, strontium, and carbon isotopes preserved in the enamel, a method that can reveal both habitat and feeding behavior. The results pointed clearly away from the open sea. The tooth carried elevated levels of the lighter oxygen isotope "O,…...

11+ hour, 30+ min ago (507+ words) A new species of pumpkin toadlet, almost the size of a pencil tip, has been discovered within the damp, shadowy leaf litter of Brazil's Atlantic Forest." The dazzlingly bright orange creature has been named Brachycephalus lulai in honor of Brazilian President Luiz In'cio Lula da Silva." This latest addition brings the total to 43 species in the incredibly diverse"Brachycephalus"genus. Reportedly, 35 of these miniature toadlets have only come to light since the year 2000." It's a small-sized specimen, yes, but it carries a surprisingly large message for conservation. "Through this tribute, we seek to encourage the expansion of conservation initiatives focused on the Atlantic Forest as a whole, and on Brazil's highly endemic miniaturized frogs in particular," the researchers from the Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP); Mater Natura " Instituto de Estudos Ambientais, Brazil, wrote in the study paper." These toadlets are diurnal,…...