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Slab (fossil)
A compression fossil is a fossil preserved in sedimentary rock that has undergone physical compression. While it is uncommon to find animals preserved as good compression fossils, it is very common to find plants preserved this way. The reason for this is that physical compression of the rock often leads to distortion of the fossil. The best fossils of leaves are found preserved in fine layers of sediment that have been compressed in a direction perpendicular to the plane of the deposited sediment. Since leaves are basically flat, the resulting distortion is minimal. Plant stems and other three-dimensional plant structures do not preserve as well under compression. Typically, only the basic outline and surface features are preserved in compression fossils; internal anatomy is not preserved. These fossils may be studied while still partially entombed in the sedimentary rock matrix where they are preserved, or once lifted out of the matrix by a peel or transfer technique. Compre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clay
Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay particles, but become hard, brittle and non–plastic upon drying or firing. Most pure clay minerals are white or light-coloured, but natural clays show a variety of colours from impurities, such as a reddish or brownish colour from small amounts of iron oxide. Clay is the oldest known ceramic material. Prehistoric humans discovered the useful properties of clay and used it for making pottery. Some of the earliest pottery shards have been dated to around 14,000 BC, and clay tablets were the first known writing medium. Clay is used in many modern industrial processes, such as paper making, cement production, and chemical filtering. Between one-half and two-thirds of the world's population live or work in buildings made with clay, often ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xu Xing (paleontologist)
Xu Xing (; born July 1969) is a Chinese paleontologist who has named more dinosaurs than any other living paleontologist. Such dinosaurs include the Jurassic ceratopsian ''Yinlong'', the Jurassic tyrannosauroid ''Guanlong'', the large oviraptorosaur ''Gigantoraptor'', and the troodontid '' Mei''. Biography Xing was born in Xinjiang, China, in 1969. A graduate from the department of geology of Peking University, he is currently a researcher at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. He had originally planned to become an economist. However, he was assigned to the department of geology by the Chinese authorities. He graduated in 1995, and claims inspiration from Roy Chapman Andrews. Among Xu's paleontological contributions have been discovery and analysis of dinosaur fossils with avian characteristics, and development of theories in regarding the evolution of feather Feathers are epidermal growths that for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Liaoning Province
Liaoning () is a coastal provinces of China, province in Northeast China that is the smallest, southernmost, and most populous province in the region. With its capital at Shenyang, it is located on the northern shore of the Yellow Sea, and is the northernmost coastal province of the China, People's Republic of China. Historically a gateway between China proper and Manchuria, the modern Liaoning province was established in 1907 as Fengtian or Fengtien province and was renamed Liaoning in 1929. It was also known at that time as Mukden Province for the Manchu language, Manchu name of ''Shengjing'', the former name of Shenyang. Under the Japanese-puppet Manchukuo regime, the province reverted to its 1907 name, but the name Liaoning was restored for a brief time in 1945 and then again in 1954. Liaoning borders the Yellow Sea (Korea Bay) and Bohai Sea in the south, North Korea's North Pyongan and Chagang provinces in the southeast, Jilin to the northeast, Hebei to the southwest, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archaeoraptor
"Archaeoraptor" is the informal generic name for a fossil chimera from China in an article published in ''National Geographic'' magazine in 1999. The magazine claimed that the fossil was a " missing link" between birds and terrestrial theropod dinosaurs. Even before this publication, there had been severe doubts about the fossil's authenticity. A further scientific study showed it to be a forgery constructed from rearranged pieces of real fossils from different species. Zhou ''et al.'' found that the head and upper body belong to a specimen of the primitive fossil bird ''Yanornis''.Zhou, Zhonghe, Clarke, Julia A., Zhang, Fucheng. "Archaeoraptor's better half." ''Nature'' Vol. 420. 21 November 2002. pp. 285. A 2002 study found that the tail belongs to a small winged dromaeosaur, ''Microraptor'', named in 2000. The legs and feet belong to an as-yet-unknown-animal.Holden, Constance. "Florida Meeting Shows Perils, Promise of Dealing for Dinos" ''Science'' 14 April 2000. Vol.288 no.5 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
National Geographic Magazine
''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widely read magazines of all time. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine months after the establishment of the society, but is now a popular magazine. In 1905, it began including pictures, a style for which it became well-known. Its first color photos appeared in the 1910s. During the Cold War, the magazine committed itself to present a balanced view of the physical and human geography of countries beyond the Iron Curtain. Later, the magazine became outspoken on environmental issues. Since 2019, controlling interest has been held by The Walt Disney Company. Topics of features generally concern geography, history, nature, science, and world culture. The magazine is well known for its distinctive appearance: a thick squar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archaeopteryx
''Archaeopteryx'' (; ), sometimes referred to by its German name, "" ( ''Primeval Bird''), is a genus of bird-like dinosaurs. The name derives from the ancient Greek (''archaīos''), meaning "ancient", and (''ptéryx''), meaning "feather" or "wing". Between the late 19th century and the early 21st century, ''Archaeopteryx'' was generally accepted by palaeontologists and popular reference books as the oldest known bird (member of the group Avialae). Older potential avialans have since been identified, including ''Anchiornis'', ''Xiaotingia'', and ''Aurornis''. ''Archaeopteryx'' lived in the Late Jurassic around 150 million years ago, in what is now southern Germany, during a time when Europe was an archipelago of islands in a shallow warm tropical sea, much closer to the equator than it is now. Similar in size to a Eurasian magpie, with the largest individuals possibly attaining the size of a raven, the largest species of ''Archaeopteryx'' could grow to about in len ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lee Spetner
Dr Lee M. Spetner is an American and Israeli creationist author, mechanical engineer, applied biophysicist, and physicist, known best for his disagreements with the modern synthesis. In spite of his opposition to neo-Darwinism, Spetner accepts a form of non-random evolution outlined in his 1996 book "Not By Chance! Shattering the Modern Theory of Evolution". Biography Education Spetner received his BS degree in mechanical engineering from the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis in 1945Worldscientific Biographies Retrieved December 2010 and his Ph.D. in physics from MIT in 1950, where ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fred Hoyle
Sir Fred Hoyle FRS (24 June 1915 – 20 August 2001) was an English astronomer who formulated the theory of stellar nucleosynthesis and was one of the authors of the influential B2FH paper. He also held controversial stances on other scientific matters—in particular his rejection of the "Big Bang" theory (a term coined by him on BBC Radio) in favor of the " Steady State" hypothesis, and his promotion of panspermia as the origin of life on Earth. He also wrote science fiction novels, short stories and radio plays, and co-authored twelve books with his son, Geoffrey Hoyle. He spent most of his working life at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge and served as its director for six years. Biography Early life and career Hoyle was born near Bingley in Gilstead, West Riding of Yorkshire, England. His father, Ben Hoyle, who was a violinist and worked in the wool trade in Bradford, served as a machine gunner in the First World War. His mother, Mabel Pickard, had studied ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sedimentary
Sedimentary rocks are types of rock (geology), rock that are formed by the accumulation or deposition of mineral or organic matter, organic particles at Earth#Surface, Earth's surface, followed by cementation (geology), cementation. Sedimentation is the collective name for processes that cause these particles to settle in place. The particles that form a sedimentary rock are called sediment, and may be composed of detritus (geology), geological detritus (minerals) or detritus, biological detritus (organic matter). The geological detritus originated from weathering and erosion of existing rocks, or from the solidification of molten lava blobs erupted by volcanoes. The geological detritus is transported to the place of deposition by water, wind, ice or Mass wasting, mass movement, which are called agents of denudation. Biological detritus was formed by bodies and parts (mainly shells) of dead aquatic organisms, as well as their fecal mass, suspended in water and slowly piling up on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Matrix (geology)
The matrix or groundmass of a rock is the finer-grained mass of material in which larger grains, crystals, or clasts are embedded. The matrix of an igneous rock consists of finer-grained, often microscopic, crystals in which larger crystals, called phenocrysts, are embedded. This porphyritic texture is indicative of multi-stage cooling of magma. For example, porphyritic andesite will have large phenocrysts of plagioclase in a fine-grained matrix. Also in South Africa, diamonds are often mined from a matrix of weathered clay-like rock (kimberlite) called "yellow ground". The matrix of sedimentary rocks is finer-grained sedimentary material, such as clay or silt, in which larger grains or clasts are embedded. It is also used to describe the rock material in which a fossil is embedded. Cementation All sediments are at first in an incoherent condition (e.g. sands, clays and gravels, beds of shells), and they may remain in this state for an indefinite period. Millions of years have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Longipteryx
''Longipteryx'' is a genus of prehistoric bird which lived during the Early Cretaceous (Aptian stage, 120.3 million years ago). It contains a single species, ''Longipteryx chaoyangensis''. Its remains have been recovered from the Jiufotang Formation at Chaoyang in Liaoning Province, China. Apart from the holotype IVPP V 12325 - a fine and nearly complete skeleton — another entire skeleton (IPPV V 12552) and some isolated bones (a humerus and furcula, specimens IPPV V 12553, and an ulna, IPPV V 12554) are known to date. The name ''Longipteryx'' means "one with long feathers", from Latin ''longus'', "long" + Ancient Greek ''pteryx'' (πτέρυξ), "wing", "feather" or "pinion". The specific name ''chaoyangensis'' is from the Latin for "from Chaoyang". Description Excluding the tail, ''Longipteryx'' was some 15 cm long overall in life. It had a long bill — longer than the rest of the head — with a few hooked teeth at the tip, and, as the name implies ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
