Extinct Species, features and articles | Educational Science

Mar 6, 2024

Woolly mammoth de-extinction inches closer after elephant stem cell breakthrough

Scientists have made a stem cell breakthrough in elephants, which could mean researchers are one step closer to bringing back long-extinct woolly mammoths, the de-extinction company Colossal Biosciences has announced. In a statement shared with Live Science, Colossal's Woolly Mammoth team says it has successfully derived induced pluripotent stem cells...

May 20, 2022

Ichthyosaur: Apex predator of the dinosaur-era seas

Ichthyosaurs were predatory marine reptiles that could grow to enormous sizes and ruled the seas during part of the dinosaur era. For a chunk of the millions of years when dinosaurs reigned over Earth's landmasses, ichthyosaurs claimed the title as maritime apex predators. These massive sea monsters appeared on Earth...

May 23, 2022

Triops: Facts about the three-eyed 'dinosaur shrimp'

Triops are a group of freshwater crustaceans commonly called tadpole shrimp or dinosaur shrimp. They look like ancient armored tadpoles, a look they've rocked for hundreds of millions of years. The word Triops means three eyes in Greek, and the group is so named because they have two main compound...

May 24, 2022

Giant 'dragon of death' with 30-foot wingspan unearthed in Argentina

Researchers in Argentina have unearthed the largest pterosaur species ever found in South America. Dubbed dragon of death by paleontologists, two giant flying reptiles were discovered in the Plottier Formation, an outcrop located in the province of Mendoza. The two specimens' wingspans measured approximately 23 feet (7 meters) wide and...

May 26, 2022

T. rex and its close relatives were warm-blooded like modern birds

Birds keep themselves warm with heat generated by some of the most hard-working metabolisms on the planet, while lizards rely on the sun to keep them toasty. Both of these groups are linked to dinosaurs, and because of this, paleontologists have long wondered if dinosaurs had so-called cold-blooded metabolisms like...

May 30, 2022

How did ‘Prehistoric Planet’ create such incredible dinosaurs? Find out in a behind-the-scenes peek.

Prehistoric Planet sends viewers back in time on a guided tour of the Cretaceous period with Sir David Attenborough, in a documentary series that reimagines familiar dinosaurs such as the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex and introduces lesser-known creatures like the charming owl-like Mononykus. The show portrays the extinct creatures moving and...

Jun 8, 2022

How little, furry mammals that scurried under dinosaurs' feet came to rule the world

Shortly after dinosaurs got their start during the Triassic period, little furry mammals began scurrying underfoot, using their powerful teeth to chomp down on plants, insects and even — eventually — dinosaurs. But how did these warm-blooded creatures arise? How did they survive the giant asteroid that slammed into Earth...

Jun 9, 2022

Crocodile-faced dinosaur may have been Europe’s largest ever predator

An enormous crocodile-faced, spiny-backed dinosaur that prowled what is now England roughly 125 million years ago was one of the largest predatory animals to ever stalk across Europe. Paleontologists unearthed the remains of this behemoth on the Isle of Wight off the southern coast of England. The researchers nicknamed the...

Jun 9, 2022

Here's how paleontologists rate 'Jurassic World: Dominion' (Video)

When dinosaur fans flock to theaters on Thursday (June 9) to see Jurassic World: Dominion (Universal Pictures, 2022), they'll be mesmerized by myriad prehistoric beasts. But how do these paleo-creatures, and the film's scientific facts in general, stack up against what's known by real-world paleontologists? To find out, Live Science...

Jun 10, 2022

Dinosaur 'reaper' with massive claws found in Japan

Millions of years ago, a bipedal dinosaur with knives for fingers stalked the shores of the Asian continent. But those Edward Scissorhandslike weapons were used for slashing vegetation rather than eviscerating animal prey, according to a new study. The dinosaur belonged to a group known as therizinosaurs — bipedal and...

Jun 14, 2022

Massive bulldog-faced dinosaur was like a T. rex on steroids

One of the world’s most dangerous prehistoric ecosystems just added another huge predator to its lineup. In the Bahariya Formation, a famous fossil site in Egypt’s Sahara Desert, a team of Egyptian and American paleontologists recently uncovered a huge fossil vertebra belonging to a newly described species of meat-eating abelisaurid...

Jun 22, 2022

Dino with 'perfect and unique' butthole also had the oldest belly button known to science

Paleontologists have discovered the oldest belly button known to science — and the first ever found on a non-avian dinosaur — on a 125 million-year-old fossil of a parrot-beaked biped in China. The faint navel mark belongs to a reptile in the genus Psittacosaurus, which lived during the Cretaceous period...

Jun 24, 2022

8-armed Jurassic 'vampire' used supersuckers to trap prey, amazing 3D images reveal

A Jurassic vampire squid-like creature used supersuckers to snatch prey out of the water column and lock it in place with a watertight seal, 3D imaging of several fossils reveals. For the first time, scientists used advanced 3D imaging techniques to examine in great detail the prey-snatching suckers of Vampyronassa...

Jul 6, 2022

Dinosaurs took over the planet because they could endure the cold, scientists say

Dinosaurs took over the planet thanks to their surprising ability to endure freezing-cold temperatures, ancient footprints have revealed. The dinosaur tracks, stamped into the sandstone and siltstone of ancient lake beds in the Junggar Basin of northwestern China, suggest that more than 200 million years ago, the reptiles had already...

Jul 7, 2022

First Gorgosaurus to hit auction block may sell for $8 million

The first specimen of the meat-eating dinosaur Gorgosaurus to ever hit the auction block will go before bidders in New York City on July 28, according to Sotheby's auction house. Gorgosaurus, an apex predator, lived from 80 million to 73 million years ago, millions of years before its more famous...