Lady with an Archaeoceratops

Lady with an Archaeoceratops ~ Watercolour with touches of gouache, approx. 138 mm. diameter

Happy New Year! May 2017 be kinder to us all.

I promised our regular reader, Andrew Stück, that I would post this piece, after he commented that it's been a while since my saurian incongruities were last seen on the blog. So here we are! 

Styracosaurs in Love and War

Ah, Dinosaur Revolution. Er, Dinotasia. Mishandled by the Discovery Channel, never allowed to blossom into its own splendid weirdness, reviled by critics (seriously, they did not like it). Director David Krentz has shared another bit of pre-production material on the Facebook page: an animatic depicting a story of Stryracosaurus intraspecific combat cut from the production. It's enjoyable on its own, but it would be wonderful to see it fully realized one day.



That desire to see it fully fleshed out just takes me back to those days of anticipating what I hoped would be a much larger phenomenon. It was always fun to see Krentz's promotional videos for DR before it aired; they were a perfect illustration of the joy so many of us take in prehistoric animals, as in this walkthrough of the Rahonavis sequence:


Regardless of the eventual handling of the work, Dinosaur Revolution must have been a joy to work on. And these rough sketches from Krentz's pen have more soul in one stroke than the entire horde of shoddy CG dinos populating the shelves of bookstores do (before you accuse me of prejudice, keep in mind that it's against the shoddy part, not the CG part). Eh. I'm feeling cranky. At least it doesn't seem that Krentz has given up; in a recent email to the Dinosaur Mailing List, he asked for other perspectives on the potential for scientific institutions to collaborate with media companies in mutually beneficial arrangements. I really hope we haven't seen the last of his work in documentaries.

UPDATE: Dinosaur blogger Mark Wildman has informed me in the comments of this post that in the UK at least, the production has been reaired under its original Reign of the Dinosaurs title. It will premiere this Thursday on the Discovery Channel at 9 o'clock GMT.

More on Dinosaur Revolution:
In Defense of Dinosaur Revolution
Review of Parts One and Two

Love in the time of chasmosaurs

I'm sure you've long been wondering - what would chasmosaur love look like? Well, thanks to deviantArtist Durbed (aka Arioch, aka Josep), you need wonder no more.

'Chasmosaurus love'. © Durbed 2012.

Oh dear. Don't forget to give Durbed's gallery a visit sometime, and yes, we did feature his work before.

On crests and feathers

People have long wondered what exactly the quite weird and wonderful head crests of both dinosaurs and pterosaurs were doing there. Why did they evolve - what were they for? Today Lethaia published (online) a paper by David Hone, Darren Naish and Innes Cuthill entitled Does mutual sexual selection explain the evolution of head crests in pterosaurs and dinosaurs? In the paper, Hone et al propose that a potential key evolutionary factor has so far been largely overlooked - that of mutual sexual selection.

Citipati, an animal unusual in combining a large, bony head crest with feathers. While the display feathers here are speculative, similar structures are known from the oviraptorosaur Caudipteryx. Art by Niroot Puttapipat.

'Mutual sexual selection' is pretty self-explanatory. While 'sexual selection' is a one-sided process, with one sex selecting for highly dimorphic traits in the other (Hone himself gives the "endlessly repeated" example of peacocks), 'mutual sexual selection' is, well, mutual. As such, it is likely that both genders of the animal concerned will have ornamentation, or similar sexually selective traits. As is noted in the paper,

"An instructive example is the crested auklet, Aethia cristatella...in which both sexes bear feather plumes on their heads [and] both sexes prefer mates with longer crests" (p. 3)

The authors contend that palaeontologists are largely ignoring this idea and failing to realise its changing status in behavioural ecology. They propose that since "there are many circumstances under which male mating time and effort are limited", and given the varying quality of females, it makes sense that males should be selective rather than simply trying to copulate with everything in sight (pp. 11-12).

In formulating this hypothesis, the authors run through a number of others that have been proposed down the years. Some, such as the evolution of crests as weaponry or thermoregulatory devices, can obviously be ruled out for a lot of species. However, what's probably going to raise people's heckles is the authors' rejection of the 'species recognition' hypothesis, that is to say the idea that (some) crested dinosaurs and pterosaurs evolved their displays so that members of the same species could recognise one another. As the authors point out, this idea doesn't explain why "lambeosaurine hadrosaurs required large crests for species recognition, when...members of [the] closely related iguanodontian lineage did not" (p. 10). They also note that a lot of animals today don't require such obvious signals to be able to differentiate between even very similar species. For example:

"...tyrant flycatchers notorious for showing little to no morphological variation exhibit clear boundaries between species, despite sympatry" (p. 9)

Mutual sexual selection also neatly solves a problem as regards ceratopsians - that although sexual dimorphism has been proposed for certain species, "the proposed degree of sexual dimorphism is weak" (p. 5) with all mature individuals in a species seemingly being near-equally well-adorned with fancy head ornaments. The same has been found to be true of certain pterosaurs and theropods. As far as theropods go, the authors note the prevalence of crests in relatively basal clades (like the coelophysoids and ceratosaurs), but hypothesise that feathers might have replaced head crests as a sexual display in more advanced coelurosaurs and especially maniraptorans (the clade that includes dromaeosaurs, troodonts, oviraptorosaurs and birds). The known presence of display feathers on animals like Caudipteryx and Epidexipteryx would appear to back up this claim (pp. 12-13).

Of course, one problem with this is that some oviraptorosaurs have well-developed crests, but were presumably fully feathered. While acknowledging this as an "anomaly", the authors point out that the clade is very unusual among coelurosaurs in this respect. Furthermore, they also contend that modern birds that possess bony head crests - like cassowaries and certain hornbills - are also very unusual in having them (p. 13).

Noting that ornithodirans (dinosaurs and pterosaurs) likely relied heavily on vision - with a great deal of evidence backing this up - Hone et al also propose that

"...the evolution of the flight-capable feather and of flight itself may well have its roots in the evolution of ornithodiran sociosexual display." (p. 14)

It's an idea that's been proposed before, but here it's presented in the context of mutual sexual selection. Could it be that, in maniraptoran dinosaurs, it was a case of both sexes trying to impress each other that sped along the evolution of the flight feather?

Obviously, this is really just scratching the surface of what's in the paper and, knowing me, I've probably cocked up somewhere along the line (cf. some of the Planet Dinosaur reviews). I'd urge you to get hold of a copy of the paper for all the information - it's actually very accessible for laymen (I should know!).

The 'Montana Dueling Dinosaurs'

There's no way anyone who reads this blog hasn't heard about this yet. But just in case...here's a very interesting interview with Peter Larson who describes this find as - without undue hyperbole - "one of the most exciting dinosaur discoveries that's ever been made".



While you're at it, be sure to check out some of the other recently-uploaded videos from the Black Hills Insititute, featuring (among others) Bob Bakker and "Dino-Cowboy" (cringe) Clayton Phipps.

Update: Brian Switek (for it is he) has authored a blog post calling into question some of the more senstational claims made by Larson and the others. Go forth and read!

A Taxonomic Shot at the Buzzer: Titanoceratops ouranos

There is more than one way to erect a new dinosaur taxa. One way, the way the public is more familiar with, is to simply find the fossil bones, determine that they are unique enough to warrant a new taxa, and name it in a descriptive paper. But often, an analysis of fossils already in a collection will lead a researcher to the conclusion that they warrant being renamed as a new species.

This is the case with the newest - presumably last - member of the ceratopsian class of 2010, Titanoceratops ouranos. In a paper published this week in Cretaceous Research, Nick Longrich of Yale proposes that an exceptionally large Pentaceratops specimen at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History is unique enough to warrant its own genus.


The Sam Noble specimen. Photo by okiebadger, via flickr.

Though this ceratopsian giant was discovered in the early forties, it wasn't until 1995 that it was released from the rock matrix containing it. It's such an exceptional specimen that its skull made the Guinness Book of World records as the largest possessed by a land vertebrate, measuring about ten feet tall when stood nose to frill. Longrich's cladistic analysis concludes that it doesn't match well with other Pentaceratops specimens, instead looking more like the skulls of that most popular tribe of ceratopsians, the triceratopsins. Longrich's paper suggests that the triceratopsins were the sole tribe of truly giant horned dinosaurs, and that they originated in the southern part of the North American continent, several million years earlier than previously thought.

Ceratopsian research is particularly vigorous right now, and it's going to be a while before all of the twigs and branches of this part of the dinosaur family tree are figured out. Since we can't observe these creatures living in the wild, we can't be totally sure which features denote species and which denote variations within those species. In this paper, Longrich provides his version of the triceratopsin tribe and does not factor in Horner and Scannella's paper lumping Torosaurus into Triceratops. So, though Titanoceratops is a very cool name... don't stake your future happiness on it sticking around forever. Though 2010 was the Year of the Ceratopsian, a simple calendar change won't shut the book. There's going to be plenty of work to mull over in 2011 and beyond.

Update: As brought up by Matt Martyniuk on the Dinosaur Mailing List, this is a pre-publication announcement of an accepted paper, so rather than the last new ceratopsian taxa of 2010, Titanoceratops might end up being the first of 2011. Bill Parker has posted about the issue of pre-publication announcements like this on taxonomy at Chinleana. I'll expand more on this in this week's Mesozoic Miscellany roundup.

Endemism in the Time of Chasmosaurs

After tossing about ideas for the title of this blog for a while, I settled on a twist on the title of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Love in the Time of Cholera. I then had to decide between dinosaurs with a nice hard "C" at the beginning of their generic name. There were some good ones. I ultimately chose "chasmosaurs" because I've always liked the name, and I liked that it wasn't a single dinosaur, but rather a whole tribe of ceratopsids, always one of my favorite groups. In contrast to their centrosaurine relatives, the chasmosaurine ceratopsids are distingushed by larger brow horns and frills.

Today, a team of scientists led by Dr. Scott Sampson has published a paper in PLoS One, revealing two new members of the chasmosaurine line: Kosmoceratops richardsoni and Utahceratops gettyi. They were denizens of the southern part of Laramidia, a small continent formed by the sea that clove North America in twain during the Late Cretaceous. Kosmoceratops sported especially odd headgear: long, sideways-pointing brow horns and swept-forward spikes lining the top of its frill.


Utahceratops and Kosmoceratops with a map of Laramidia. Copyright Lukas Panzarin, provided by the University of Utah.

As you would expect from research led by Dr. Sampson, the paper concerns itself with larger issues of dinosaur ecology. The authors present a convincing scenario of two coexisting lines of chasmosaurs, one in the north and one in the south, separated by an as-yet unknown barrier.

Laramidia was a strange place. There was a narrow strip of land crammed between the sea mentioned earlier and a great mountain range containing the future Sierra Nevadas (the Rockies were only just beginning to form). Most of the North American late cretaceous dinosaurs we know are from this ribbon of low-lying land on Laramidia, a veritable dinosaurian paradise. This is the big, exciting question the paper asks. Why was there such a stunning diversity of dinosaurs in such a small area? I'm looking forward to more discoveries, and more reconstructions by Lukas Panzarin. Dude's got skills.

More:
The Open Source Paleontologist (the blog of paper co-author Andrew Farke)
DinoChick Blogs
Dinosaur Tracking
Discovery News
University of Utah press release

Further Musings on Serendipaceratops

One of the scientists in the media I've come to trust and respect is Steven Novella, the neurologist who co-founded the New England Skeptical Society, hosts The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe podcast, and blogs prolifically. In addition to being knowledgeable in a wide variety of scientific fields, he has that rare ability to clearly articulate the workings of science. A sentiment I've heard him express a few times on the SGU is that contrary to science-deniers' claims of a conspiracy to preserve the status quo, scientists relish when a hypothesis is proven wrong. Or when a provisionally accepted fact is upended. These occurrences create questions. And questions are what fuel science. Like most people, I have little contact with scientists in my daily life. I'd like to think that Dr. Novella's observation is mostly true of scientists in general. He's extremely wary of casually making weak generalizations, but I'd love to hear about the experiences of other people.

This isn't to say that I expect superhuman levels of objectivity and logic of scientists. Everyone has flaws in their thinking. But scientists - at least those who have paid their academic dues - are trained to recognize those flaws so they don't influence the work. What I expect of scientists (and hope of anyone) is healthy skepticism, especially of their own conclusions and biases. This is a basic requirement, really. I try to hold myself to the same standard.

What does this have to do with Serendipaceratops? Paleontology has always been my favorite scientific pursuit to learn about, and part of that is because it's such a rich mental playground, pulling in so many other sciences. Serendipaceratops is one of those tasty mysteries that makes you consider possibilities, flex the brain muscle, so to speak. That it's only one or two bones only makes it more intriguing. Maybe it will never be solved. That's okay. Science is a process, and even dead ends can yield worthwhile insights.

Sometimes when I'm writing I'll imagine someone stumbling across this blog who doesn't care a whit for dinosaurs or paleontology or natural history. They might read about this odd bone from Australia and think that fussing over such a thing is ridiculous. What does it really matter? I can put myself in that person's shoes and understand why digging up ancient bones may seem that way. But I'd ask that person which of the following options is the most ridiculous, when you've pulled a fossil out of the ground.

1. Make up something off of the top of your head.
2. Toss it aside and forget it.
3. Do paleontology.

In my opinion, number three is the only reasonable choice.

Finally, thanks to the commenters yesterday for giving me more to mull over. I've put out a request for a recent paper that offers an alternate hypothesis for Serendipaceratops' identity and may post on that if I'm lucky enough to receive it. If anyone else has any more information that might help, pass it my way - I think I've been pretty diligent about researching this critter, but there's not a lot out there.

Serendipaceratops arthurcclarkei, an Australian Mystery

Serendipaceratops arthurcclarkei is one of the mysteries of dinosaur-kind, lurking Gollum-like in the shadows, threatening to overturn everything we know about the ceratopsians, sowing doubt and confusion. Well, maybe not everything, but possibly their origins and certainly their geographical distribution. In March of 2004, National Geographic News posted a story about the Dinosaurs of Darkness traveling exhibition curated by Monash University paleontologist Patricia Vickers-Rich, and the story briefly mentions the strange new dinosaur from Australia:

Other dinosaurs from southern Australia include Serendipaceratops arthurcclarkei, one of the oldest horned, or frilled, dinosaurs known, which suggests that horned dinosaurs may have originated in the southern polar region.

"That group is most well known from Mongolia, where Protoceratops occurs in the very late Mesozoic/late Cretaceous. The material of Australian origin is early Cretaceous," Vickers-Rich said.

Nat Geo's reporter, John Roach, may have misunderstood Vickers-Rich; her quote doesn't claim that horned dinosaurs originated in Australia (and I've been unable to find any quotes from her that do), but refers specifically to those ceratopsians to which Serendipaceratops is most closely related. It's still a puzzling story.


Leptoceratops by Peter Trusler, via Wikimedia Commons.

Known only from a single ulna - and possibly another pulled from the nearby Dinosaur Cove fossil locale - Serendipaceratops is a huge question mark. Initially skeptical, Vickers-Rich and her partner-in-paleontology, Thomas Rich, decided that the ulna belonged to a ceratopsian based on its strong resemblance to the corresponding bone of Leptoceratops, a well-known Late Cretaceous dinosaur from North America. Lepto is closely related to the more famous Protoceratops, also known only from the Late Cretaceous. Therein lies the problem: if you accept the protoceratopsian nature of Serendipaceratops, it lived tens of millions of years before anything that resembled it. What the heck is it doing in Australia?

It may not seem like a big deal, but consider the following:

• Yinlong, the earliest confirmed ceratopsian, hails from Jurassic China.
• Every other ceratopsian known to paleontologists comes from Asia, Europe, or North America.
• The vast majority of protoceratopsians come from China and Mongolia.

At the time of Yinlong, the continents we know today were still mashed together into the supercontinent Pangaea (click for map). Pangaea was a great C-shaped landmass, with the areas we know as Australia and China at opposite ends. It's possible that ceratopsians might have ranged between Australia and China; it simply would have required populations to travel between those terminal points of the "C" via Africa or South America, and possibly India. You would expect to find something similar to either protoceratopsids or primitive ceratopsians somewhere in these places. To date, none have been found (save for one dubious jawbone from South America that has been lost), but there also aren't many rich, temporally relevant dinosaur-bearing deposits in those regions.

In the recent description of Sinoceratops, the only non-North American ceratopsid, Xu Xing wrote that the apparent endemism of ceratopsids to North America probably reflects gaps in the fossil record rather than actual limitations on the family's Cretaceous range. The mystery of Serendipaceratops is complicated by much larger gaps. And at least Sinoceratops has the decency to have been contemporary with its ceratopsid kin.

It seems simpler to me that the ulna's resemblance to that of Leptoceratops is a coincidence. That's where my money would be, if gambling on paleontology was a sane thing to engage in. Hopefully, the notoriously stingy Australian strata will give up more related material. At the very least, if Serendipaceratops is not a ceratopsian, it's a totally unique Australian dinosaur. That's a pretty good resolution, and still a worthy tribute to the man it was named for.

Ceratopsian Wrangling

Here's a roundup of links relating to some of the new ceratopsians we've been delighting in recently. Of course, many of the new taxa introduced in the last couple of weeks come from the long-awaited new book New Perspectives on Horned Dinosaurs: the Royal Tyrrell Museum Ceratopsian Symposium. The symposium was held in the autumn of 2007, and brought together a couple hundred experts in the field to share recent research.

Michael J. Ryan talks Medusaceratops lokii
The Vancouver Sun has an article about Medusaceratops featuring New Perspectives on Horned Dinosaurs lead editor, paleontologist Michael J. Ryan. Regarding the name he gave the new ceratopsian, he tells the paper, "One of the things I have a problem with as a paleontologist is how some of my colleagues come up with terribly unpronounceable names... I like to give my dinosaurs names that roll off the tongue and actually evoke an image." Hear, hear.

Jim Kirkland writes about Diabloceratops eatoni
In a guest post at Dave Hone's Archosaur Musings, paleontologist Jim Kirkland sums up what's cool about the new, also-wonderfully-named Diabloceratops. There are some fine photos of the skull, which is a thing of beauty.

Four foot horns from Mexico

Reconstruction by Lukas Panzarin

Coahuilaceratops magnacuerna is the new ceratopsian from Mexico, making news because of its enormous horns. I'd expect a story about it from Nat Geo soonish, as they partially funded the Utah Museum of Natural History dig.

Ojoceratops fowleri
The Bisti-De-Na-Zin Wilderness of New Mexico recently produced the tyrannosaur Bistahieversor, and now gives us Ojoceratops, a mid-size ceratopsian. Discovered by a team led by Robert M. Sullivan of State College of Pennsylvania, Ojoceratops gets its name from the Ojo Alamo Formation in which its bones were found. It's a controversial rock formation, as it is right at the boundary of the Cretaceous and the Paleocene, the first age of the post-dinosaur world. Paleontologist Jim Fassett has argued for years that dinosaurs may have survived a while after the Chicxulub impact based on fossils found in this layer. Sullivan has argued against this, so I doubt that any such assertions will be in the description. There's a great summary of the Ojo Alamo controversy at Laelaps; articles on Ojoceratops at the Santa Fe New Mexican and Pennlive.com.

These are the few that have received coverage; there are more that haven't had much written about them, including Rubeosaurus, Utahceratops*, and Tatankaceratops. I wrote a bit on Ajkaceratops and a bit more on Sinoceratops. A good place to keep up with recent discoveries, including plenty I haven't had the time to write about, is Dinosaur Central.

Finally, if you're a Facebooker, Ceratopsians have their own fan group, moderated by the Royal Tyrrell's Darren Tanke. More exciting than the Beyonce group, for sure.

*Kind reader 220mya has informed me that Utahceratops is not included in this title, and not yet described.

Yinlong and the Roots of the Ceratopsian Family Tree

In December, I wrote about one of the coolest toy lines I've seen in a long time: Evolvems, plush animals that reveal one of their evolutionary descendants when turned inside out. The Evolvem I posted was the lone dinosaur pair in the line: Yinlong-Styracosaurus. Styracosaurus is one of the most popular ceratopsids, appearing in children's books and toy lines for years because of its handsome, spike-studded frill. Yinlong, however, is pretty obscure.

It's easy to understand why. It's a recently discovered dinosaur, its Chinese name (meaning "hidden dragon") doesn't immediately suggest "dinosaur" to English-attuned ears, and it's not exactly a giant. To most people, it probably seems pretty humble.


Yinlong downsi by Andrey Atuchin, via the Natural History Museum, London

But the Evolvems brain trust picked Styracosaurus' partner-in-plush for a good reason. Discovered in China in Jurassic rock, Yinlong downsi is the oldest ceratopsian yet discovered. It lived alongside Guanlong wucai, an early relative of T. rex. If you were going to give T. rex and Triceratops the "Muppet Babies" treatment, you could set it in Late Jurassic China.

This spells out a likely Asian origin for the ceratopsians. Sinoceratops, the new Chinese ceratopsid, opens the possibility that these more derived members of the group may also have their origin in China, rather than arising in North America after more primitive ceratopsians found their way there via the Asian-Alaskan land bridge formed in the Cretaceous. It's also plausible, to me at least, that Sinoceratops or its recent ancestors wandered back to Asia from North America. Perhaps something about its biology - more generalized, mixing traits of the centrosaurines and chasmosaurines - made it better suited for its Chinese habitat, thus making this hypothetical migration - probably occurring over many generations - a reasonable pursuit. Bear in mind, I haven't read anyone put this forward, so it's just my idle speculation. Hopefully some earlier Cretaceous strata will cough up some ceratopsids of their own.

Sinoceratops and the Ceratopsian Family Tree

I think I'll keep the ceratopsian train chugging along here. First, a correction. Yesterday I mentioned that the Sinoceratops description in the Chinese Science Bulletin puts forth the idea that the ceratops-ians may have originated in Asia. Actually, Xu Xing and his coauthors write this of the ceratops-ids. Those couple letters make a big difference. My lovely brain has a nasty habit of fudging subtle details like those suffixes. Maybe laying out the context into which these new dinosaurs fit will be a sort of mental strength training.

When I began writing today, I figured I'd talk about Yinlong, an important basal ceratopsian from China. But I think it may be better to draw the big picture, the ceratopsian family tree, if you will, and save Yinlong for tomorrow. This will dip into the often maddening world of taxonomy, the classification of living things, which is an even more difficult undertaking when dealing with a source of data as fragmentary as the fossil record. While I'm not looking to get granular, I'll preface this by saying that names of groups and the members therein may change as paleontologists find new fossils and debate how the old ones relate to each other.

The ceratopsians are a member of the largely herbivorous clan of dinosaurs called the ornithischians, which I discussed a bit in a post from last August. Most of the ceratopsians, save for some of the most primitive, are quadrupedal, and the group ranges widely in size, from as big as a dog to larger than an elephant.


The pelvic differences between saurischians and ornithischians. By yours truly, a derivative work based on separate diagrams by wikimedia user Frederik.

The ceratopsians all share a completely unique bone called the rostrum, which forms the top half of their beaks. Find one of these, and you've got a ceratopsian for sure.

There are many families under the ceratopsian umbrella, but I'm not going to get into the details of all of them. As this review is spurred by the Sinoceratops discovery, I'll instead discuss its family, the ceratopsids: the largest ceratopsians, distinguished from each other by a variety of ornaments on their skull. The basics are the bony frill extending from the back of their heads and the horns, bumps, and knobs on their faces - working from these basic elements, the variety is astounding.

Based on these ornaments, the ceratopsids are then divided into two main posses: the centrosaurinae, which generally bear larger nose horns with smaller frills and brow horns, and the chasmosaurinae, which have the opposite arrangement. Looking at those horns is a good way to get a rough idea of what kind of ceratopsid you're dealing with - just as you might look at the shape of a beak to begin to identify a strange bird in your yard. Some prominent chasmosaurines are Triceratops, Chasmosaurus, and the new Medusaceratops; the centrosaurines include Styracosaurus, Einosaurus, and Centrosaurus. Sinoceratops is notable for the blend of centrosaurine and chasmosaurine characteristics in its skull, which is the basis for Xing's idea of an Asian origin for the ceratopsids.


Centrosaurines, by Nobu Tamura, via Wikimedia Commons

It used to be a given that if a new ceratopsid was discovered, it would be from western North America in Cretaceous rock. Sinoceratops naturally flips the geographical part of that on its head, and raises questions about how wide the range of this classically North American group could have been. Xing floats two guesses as to why ceratopsids are mostly found in North America. First, there may have been factors that limited the ceratopsids geographically, and what we see is what we get. This is certainly plausible, but a bit shaky considering how few windows to the Cretaceous the rocks give us. He favors the second option, which is that we simply haven't found everything. Sinoceratops is a tantalizing look at what may be there waiting to be unearthed.

The Open Dinosaur Project

So let's say you're interested in studying the ornithischian family tree. Particularly, you're interested in the ways they moved about and how they arrived at them. You've got a large group of dinosaurs who all share a bipedal ancestor, yet three divergent groups independently adopted quadrupedal locomotion: the stegosaurs and ankylosaurs, the ceratopsians, and the duckbills. It's a lot of convergent evolution for this sprawling dinosaur clan. It's a lot of data to collect for human paleontologists. A lot of work.

Solution? Open up the data-collecting end of the research. Thus, the Open Dinosaur Project is born. Using the internet, gather interested people who are willing to wade into the scientific literature to collect measurements of ornithischian limbs.

Living, accessible science. Cool.