@invertebratepal.bsky.social
Mexican ๐ฒ๐ฝ paleobiologist interested in the origin of the modern marine biosphere, animal macroevolution and phylogeny. Associate Professor and Curator of Invertebrate Paleontology at the Museum of Comparative Zoology and OEB at Harvard - he/him
Caption: The Tardigrade can survive the heat of a volcano and the vacuum of space, but it prefers an open fire, a good book and a chilled Sancerre. Image: A tardigrade (a cute, plump micro-animal with eight legs - six of which are in view) sits in a tiny armchair, reading with a glass of wine in one hand and a smile on its face.
My cartoon for this weekโs @newscientist.com
06.04.2025 11:46 โ ๐ 1982 ๐ 517 ๐ฌ 25 ๐ 36
MASSIVELY excited to see Tityus achilles, South America's first #venom spraying #scorpion, finally described in
@zoojlinnsoc.bsky.social !
This new species from #Colombia can spray venom at potential predators, a striking case of convergent #evolution ๐งต (1/n)
academic.oup.com/zoolinnean/a...
An image showing a range of fossil scorpions, arranged by age. These are lovely fossils, ranging from scorpions in rocks, through ones dissolved out of rocks or resolved using CT scans, to photos of more recent scorpions in Amber. If you want the full details: (A) Palaeophonus caledonicus Hunter, 1886 (Dick Institute, Kilmarnock, UK) from the mid-Silurian (Llandovery to Wenlock) of Lesmahagow, Scotland, UK, image courtesy of Lyndsay C. Jess, and by permission of East Ayrshire Council/East Ayrshire Leisure Trust, and a reconstruction from Pocock (1901). (B) mid-Silurian Eramoscorpius brucensis Waddington, Rudkin & Dunlop, 2015 from Canada. (C) Proscorpius osborni Whitfield (1885b), Yale Peabody Museum (YPM IP 545850); photo by Jessica Utrup 2019. (D) Lower Devonian Waeringoscorpio hefteri Stรธrmer (1970, image source Poschmann et al., 2008). (E) Pulmonoscorpius kirktonensis from the Lower Carboniferous of the UK (courtesy of Andrew Jeram). (F) Compsoscorpius buthiformis from the Upper Carboniferous of the UK (left: courtesy of Lorenzo Prendini, AMNH; right: Legg et al., 2012). (G) Carboniferous taxon Cyclophthalmus senior from the Yale Peabody Museum collections (YPM IP 029827), photo by Jessica Utrup 2013. (H) Mesophonus perornatus from from the Triassic of the UK (courtesy of Lorenzo Prendini, AMNH). (I) Protoischnurus axelrodorum from the Cretaceous Crato Formation, Brazil (courtesy of Christian Neumann, Berlin). (J) Centruroides knodeli from Neogene Dominican amber (courtesy of Wilson Lourenรงo, Paris). (K) Tityus azari from Neogene Dominican Amber (courtesy of Wilson Lourenรงo, Paris).
For #FossilFriday have you ever considered the scorpion fossil record? This is surprisingly rich, but how we categorize these animals transcends being a hot mess. It's a spicy disaster. My colleague Jason and I wrote a paper on it which came out today:
peerj.com/articles/185...
โ๏ธ๐งช๐ฆ๐ฆ #evosky
We always encourage diverse perspectives in our research group and aim to cater to a broad audience, but sometimes lab meetings are not for the faint of heart ๐
22.11.2024 18:42 โ ๐ 6 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 0 ๐ 0QRP with your sketch vs final #art!
#arttrain #sciart
One of my rare legible sketches, the two fossil tardigrades trapped in amber: Beorn & Aerobius
If you want to learn more, check out this other OA study by Marc from earlier this year, feat. @jopabinia.bsky.social. Here, he formally redescribed two tiny fossils from Cretaceous amber and used them as calibrations to pinpoint major events in tardigrade evolution ๐คฉ
www.nature.com/articles/s42...
This OA study was published with the support of the MCZ at Harvard, and is part of Marc's dissertation on the origin and evolution of the tardigrade body plan. Thanks to collaborators Frank Smith and Mandy Game from UNF for hosting land supporting Marc during the experimental phase of this work ๐คฉ
19.11.2024 14:30 โ ๐ 3 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 1 ๐ 0
Lets share some science! @harvardoeb.bsky.social Marc Mapalo uses limb patterning genes to understand the evolution of tardigrade legs... turns out tardigrade legs have a predominant distal identity relative to those of arthropods & onychophorans ๐คฏ
evodevojournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
At long last, the Lab for Invertebrate Paleobiology and Evolution @harvardoeb.bsky.social is getting on the bandwagon! Thanks for the early adopter followers making the transition easier ๐ Will soon resume posting news about our crew and research, stay tuned!
ortega-hernandezlab.oeb.harvard.edu
