Isaac Kerr

Biomechanical limits of hopping in the hindlimbs of giant extinct kangaroos - Scientific Reports The locomotor abilities of animals depend upon their body size. Today, kangaroos are the largest hopping mammals, but some of their Pleistocene relatives were larger still—more than twice as heavy as any modern kangaroo. So, is there an upper size limit of bipedal hopping? Previous analyses have recovered an upper limit of ~ 140–160 kg based on allometry, but have suggested that incorporating changes in hindlimb scaling patterns among giant species would alter these conclusions. Here, we test this proposal by integrating scaling data from modern kangaroos with direct observation of the hindlimb bones of giant fossil kangaroos. We test two potential limiting factors on hopping—bone strength, and tendon size. We find that (a) the metatarsals of giant kangaroos would be capable of resisting the bending moments involved in hopping, and (b), the calcanea (heel bones) of giant kangaroos could accommodate tendons large enough to resist the loads generated during hopping. While hopping may not have been their primary mode of locomotion, our findings suggest that it may have formed part of a broader locomotor repertoire, for example for short bursts of speed.

Giant ancestors of modern-day kangaroos — which previous research has estimated could weigh up to 250 kilograms — may have been able to hop in short bursts, according to research published in Scientific Reports: spklr.io/633258xjaX

#Palaeontology 🧪

“New technologies will come along to save the environment.” What they said versus where we are:

From the new Private Eye, in shops now.

Happened to my capsicums too 😓

New research takes us inside the brain of a 230-million-year-old animal! Scientists used 3D technology and mathematical modeling to reconstruct the brains of pterosaurs and their pre-flight ancestors, the lagerpetids.

doi.org/10.1098/rsos...
new paper out now with @royalsociety.org on limb structure & function of the #fossil #kangaroo, Dorcopsoides fossilis, from central Australia. The oldest known macropodine (subfamily of all but one of living roos) & a fun glimpse into the great Late Miocene kangaroo radiation

Multiple exceptionally preserved fossils from the Paleocene Waipara Greensand inform the diversity of the oldest stem group Sphenisciformes and the formation of their diving adaptations Abstract. We report new stem group sphenisciforms (ancestral penguins) from the Paleocene of the Waipara Greensand (Canterbury, New Zealand), and describe

60 million years ago, eastern #Aotearoa New Zealand was #penguin paradise!

We describe 4 archaic penguin species from the Waipara Greensand, North Canterbury. This now totals 10 species from there, in addition to a diversity of Paleocene penguins from Otago and Chatham Island.
#fossil #birds

A cornucopia of tiny, bizarre whales used to live in Australian waters – here’s one of them If alive today, these tiny whales would be as iconically Australian as kangaroos.

A few years in the making, but I can finally share my first PhD paper and my first ever first-authored whale paper. In it, we name a new species of toothed baleen whale: Janjucetus dullardi. You can find our conversation article here: tinyurl.com/dullardi

Australia’s “funny little wallaby” fossil linked to New Guinea forest wallabies A fossil kangaroo from central Australia related to “cute and peculiar” wallaby on New Guinea builds picture ancient environments.

Nice article by Cosmos on our new fossil forest-wallaby from central Australia

cosmosmagazine.com/history/pala...

Seen from the side, a four-legged mammal with a unique horn at the tip of its snout. Displayed as though walking; positioned in the middle of the room with fossil displays of other species on either side.

#FossilFriday Megacerops robustus, 38-34 mya, #SouthDakota, at the Yale Peabody Museum

Another case of island gigantism: the extinct Hodgens’ Waterhen (Tribonyx hodgenorum) is a member of Porzana (Aves: Rallidae) - Journal of Ornithology Tribonyx hodgenorum (Scarlett, Rec Canterb Mus 6:265–266, 1955) was a flightless rail (Rallidae) endemic to Aotearoa New Zealand that became extinct in the eighteenth century. The affinities of this r...

New #research out today led by George Sangster, with Trevor Worthy, Pascale Lubbe, Paul Scofield & myself.

Recently #extinct flightless #rail Hodgens' waterhen from #Aotearoa New Zealand is a 'giant' crake of the genus Porzana, rather than a nativehen of Tribonyx.

(📷 credits given in ALT text)

A close relative of the strange and very cute dorcopsins (forest-wallabies), today found only in New Guinea. They are very under-studied - we don't even know what they eat, much about how they move, etc.

A new fossil kangaroo species of the genus Dorcopsoides (Marsupialia, Macropodinae) from the late Miocene Ongeva Local Fauna, central Australia The kangaroo tribe Dorcopsini is represented today by six species of New Guinean forest-wallaby. However, the group has a patchy fossil record beginning on the Australian mainland in the upper Mioc...

NEW #RESEARCH WOOHOO
Here's our description of Dorcopsoides cowpatensis sp. nov., a little #fossil macropodine #kangaroo from the late Miocene Ongeva locality in central #Australia.
doi.org/10.1080/0311...

This would be such a huge loss to the biology community......

Once more some mammoths

Digital drawing of Anisodon grande, a species of chalicothere. It is a mammal with a somewhat horselike head, very long arms with large claws and very short hind limbs, giving it a sloping back and gorilla-like shape. The animal is coloured orange-brown with a white belly and has a small mane and a beard-like tuft of fur on its throat.

Midsummer cottage doodle: Anisodon grande, a wonderfully weird gorilla-horse from the Miocene of Europe.

I gave her a pacing gait as in camels and other animals with short torsos and long legs, where ordinary walking gait might cause the front and hind limbs to collide.

Ozboneviz: an Australian precedent in FAIR 3D imagery and extended biodiversity collections Abstract. Billions of specimens are in biodiversity collections worldwide, and this infrastructure is crucial for research on Earth's natural history. Thre

Today we’re publishing Ozboneviz, an open-access 3D atlas of Australian vertebrate (mostly mammal) bones: doi.org/10.1093/bios...

Earliest amniote tracks recalibrate the timeline of tetrapod evolution - Nature Analysis of a fossil trackway from the earliest Carboniferous of Australia shows prints of toes with claws, suggesting that the origin of amniotes was at least 35–40 million years earlier than pr...

doi.org/10.1038/s415...

#tetrapods are older than we thought! Cool new #trackways #research in @nature.com from Flinders colleagues

Hit submit on two #fossil papers in two days, it feels goooood to have some fun new #research out soon(ish) on the funny little ancestral #kangaroo that is Dorcopsoides...

I agree though, we still know very little. Especially with regards to the variation within Sthenurinae, which often gets treated as a unit when talking about locomotion etc but is surely very varied. I'd be very keen to chat about them sometime!

You make very good points, I just can't see how they wouldn't topple forwards! Strange animals.

Looks great! I love their crazy hands.
If I had a note it would be that it's hard to see them leaning so far forward without a big tail to counterbalance, and the pelvic morphology would support a more upright stance...

New #evolution #research on dear little rat-kangaroos from Flinders Palaeos! (amongst distinguished others)

Kiana Cliff: a new fossil vertebrate site of probable last interglacial age from Eyre Peninsula, South Australia The distributions of modern vertebrate species and their molecular phylogenetic relationships across southern mainland Australia point to a long and complex history of dispersal and vicariance shap...

Out now with Transactions of @royalsocietysa.bsky.social: #fossil #research from friends & colleagues describing an interesting #palaeofauna from the oft-forgotten but (as they demonstrate) biogeographically important Eyre Peninsula, South Australia. Have a look!

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

The “silent majority” of Australians support having more national parks, no matter who they vote for. Listen to the full interview and learn more about the study from @monashuniversity.bsky.social via our website: biodiversitycouncil.org.au/news/austral...
🌱 🐨 🦘 🐸 ⛺ 🥾 🌳

An annotated checklist of Australasian fossil mammals Australasia has had a rich history of discovery of fossil mammals, with the first specimens collected within Wellington Caves, New South Wales and described by Richard Owen in 1838. Currently, a to...

New publication: taxonomy and classification of every fossil mammal species in Australasia—Wallace Line to New Zealand!

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

If ever you are displeased with a taxonomic description, I hope you can be comforted by the low bar set here by George Shaw in 1800 – still the taxonomic authority on the common wombat, Vombatus ursinus...

Truly social media at Australian universities - Online petition We call on universities and other higher education institutions in Australia to shut down their accounts on 'X' (formerly, 'Twitter') as soon as possible. Their presence on X/Twitter is incompatible w...

I've just created a new petition demanding Australian universities dump X/Twitter (#Xitter) in favour of other, more socially responsible social-media platforms

www.openpetition.org/au/petition/...

Please sign and share widely

#eXit #AcademicSky #AcademicChatter