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School of Medicine >   Department of Anatomical Sciences >   Fossil Laboratory >   Research

Research

While the Stony Brook Vertebrate Fossil Preparation Lab prepares fossils from many areas in the world (green dots ), three major initiatives (red stars ) are responsible for the majority of the work undertaken.

 


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The Late Cretaceous of the Mahajanga Basin, Madagascar

STONY BROOK PROJECT LEADERS: Dr. David Krause and Dr. Catherine Forster

The face of the Earth changed greatly during the Late Jurassic and Cretaceous. It is during this interval that the southern supercontinent Gondwana fragmented into isolated landmasses, with dramatic consequences for the associated terrestrial and freshwater vertebrate fauna. Reconstructions of the timing and sequence of this fragmentation are based almost entirely on geophysical evidence and remain poorly tested paleontologically. When, how, and from where the ancestors of the extant vertebrates of Madagascar arrived on the island remain among the most intriguing questions of natural history.

The Mahajanga Basin Project was initiated in 1993 and is conducted jointly by paleontologists from Stony Brook University and the University of Antananarivo in Madagascar.  Discoveries in the Mahajanga Basin of northwestern Madagascar have uncovered some of the most complete and scientifically significant specimens of Late Cretaceous vertebrate animals in the world, including specimens of fishes, frogs, turtles, lizards, snakes, crocodyliforms, dinosaurs, birds, and mammals. Research on these discoveries has provided important information on the anatomy and relationships of many animals, documentation of the geological structure and history of the basin, key insights into the biogeographic origins of vertebrate faunas on the island, and crucial new implications for the plate tectonic history of Gondwana during the Mesozoic Era.

Field work has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the National Geographic Society.

 


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The Late Triassic Chile Formation, New Mexico, USA

Stony Brook Project Leader, Dr. Alan H. Turner

Much work has been done on the subject of the extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. But rather than focus on the demise of these animals, relatively little work has concentrated on their origins. Where did they come from? How did they diversify? Why were they more successful than some of their early contemporaries? When did dinosaurs first get big? We know that dinosaurs originated in the Late Triassic Period some 230 to 200 million years ago. Their origins marked a replacement of faunas previously dominated by a variety of basal archosaur lineages such a aetosaurs and “rauisuchians”. Until recently the only evidence of dinosaur precursors was from the Middle Triassic Chañares Formation of Argentina. The recently discovered Hayden Quarry near Ghost Ranch New Mexico is providing a window into the early evolution of dinosaurs and their immediate precursors.

The Hayden Quarry contains the remains of many different Late Triassic vertebrates, from fish to dinosaurs. Animals found include the large aquatic metoposaurid amphibians, crocodile-like phytosaurs, armored aetosaurs, bipedal early crocodylomorph relatives, and dinosaurs. What is most exciting about the locality is that it contains a variety of true dinosaurs, as well as their closest relatives. Thus, we have preserved in the Hayden Quarry the transition from dinosaur precursors to true dinosaurs. By understanding how these species fit in the family tree, we can understand the timing of the diversification of the first dinosaurs and their relatives. When we compare the Hayden Quarry to other nearby localities with dinosaurs (for example, the Coelophysis Quarry), we can understand how long or fast it took for dinosaurs to go from being just another group to dominating the landscape.

Located at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico, the area is better known as the inspiration for many of Georgia O'Keeffe's paintings. The quarry is found within rocks called the Chinle Formation, which was deposited as river sediments between 220 to 205 million years ago during the Late Triassic Period. The quarry is probably between 210 and 215 million years old. For the past four summers, a team of researchers from Stony Brook University, the University of California Museum of Paleontology, the American Museum of Natural History, The Field Museum of Natural History, and the University of Utah has worked this new locality and preliminary descriptive and phylogenetic work in currently underway. Stay tuned!

Fieldwork has been funded by the National Geographic Society


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The Late Cretaceous and Early Tertiary faunas of the Taoudenit and Iullemeden Basins, Republic of Mali

STONY BROOK PROJECT LEADER: Dr. Maureen O'Leary

The Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (65 million years ago) represents one of the five largest mass extinction events in Earth history. This extinction event marks a transition point when dinosaurs (other than birds) became extinct and modern orders of mammals first appeared. Identifying geological sections from various continents to which vertebrate fossils can be tied is very important for understanding which species of vertebrates went extinct and which survived this extinction event. Mali is one of several countries in the modern Sahara desert that has exposures of rock formations left by shallow seaways that existed before and which survived. Current research focuses on understanding vertebrate evolution across the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary in southern West Africa. Finding the remains of species that lived within and along this ancient seaway, including the extinct relatives of modern-day mammals, is of continued interest for Dr. O'Leary and her team.

Explorations of rocks from the Taoudenit and Iullemeden Basins in Mali began in 1999, and have resulted in the discovery of dinosaurs, fossil forests, invertebrates, fishes, turtles, and crocodiles. Dr. O'Leary and other researchers from the Unites States work in collaboration with the Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique et Technologique in the Republic of Mali.

Field work has been funded by the Saurus Institute, the Cranbrook Institute of Science, the L. S. B. Leakey Foundation, and the National Geographic Society.

 


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The Paleocene of the Crazy Mountains Basin, Montana, USA

STONY BROOK PROJECT LEADERS: Doug Boyer, Dr. David Krause

In the ten million years following the extinction of dinosaurs, during the Paleocene epoch (ca. 65-55 mya), mammals underwent a major adaptive radiation and became dominant land animals. A large-scale turnover in mammalian faunas, among the most significant during the Early Cenozoic, occurred from the middle Paleocene to the late Paleocene. Despite the fact that almost one-half of the known orders of Cenozoic mammals arose in the Paleocene, less is known about composition and diversity of mammalian faunas during this time than any of the later epochs.

The eastern Crazy Mountains Basin of south-central Montana contains the best-known sequence of middle-to-late Paleocene localities for fossil mammals in the world.   Researchers from Stony Brook University, the University of Michigan, and elsewhere have conducted periodic field expeditions to the Crazy Mountains Basin for decades. Much of the large collection previously amassed by Stony Brook University field crews in the 1980s remains to be described and employed in analyses to test hypotheses of faunal and climatic change. Additionally, a freshwater limestone locality known for its remarkable preservation of small mammal skeletons was relocated in 2002, promising to yield new material otherwise unavailable from the Paleocene of North America.

Field work has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the Geological Society of America.

Stony Brook University
Department of Anatomical Sciences
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Stony Brook, NY 11794
(631) 444-3171
e-mail inquiries: jgroenke@notes.cc.sunysb.edu


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Last Modified on 09/03/2009