The Tyrannosaurus rex of "Jurassic Park" fame chases any prey that moves, then devours it with a bone-crushing gnash of its enormous jaws and serrated teeth. But paleontologists don't necessarily back Steven Spielberg's portrayal of T. rex, with some saying it may have simply scavenged the remains of dead animals it happened to find.
Now scientists have unearthed what they say is the first direct evidence that the dinosaur king hunted its prey, further supporting its reign at the top of the Cretaceous food chain.
The team excavated the 1.5-inch crown of a T. rex tooth lodged between the fused vertebrae of a hadrosaur, a plant-eating duck-billed dinosaur. The vertebrae had grown around the chisel-shaped tooth ? indicating that the hadrosaur was alive when it was attacked, according to a report published Monday by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Scientists have debated T. rex's feeding behavior for more than a century. Skeletal fossils indicate the creatures were well-suited to hunting, with long serrated teeth, strong hind limbs and a massive skull. Fossil remains bearing T. rex tooth marks, as well as partially digested bones alongside T. rex remains, indicate that the massive creatures ate meat.
While those discoveries might suggest that T. rex fatally attacked its prey, they are also consistent with the possibility that the prey was already dead before T. rex took its first bite. Experts in both camps have ardently defended their positions.
To prove that T. rex was a predator and not just a scavenger, paleontologists needed to find signs of healing in an animal that had escaped an attack. The tooth crown and vertebrae found in South Dakota's Hell Creek Formation is "the piece that settles the controversy," said University of Kansas paleontologist David Burnham, a member of the study team.
That doesn't mean T. rex hunted everything it ate, Burnham and his colleagues wrote. Tooth-punctured fossils lacking signs of wound healing could be evidence that the dinosaurs also fed on carrion.
Large carnivores eat dead animals when they can, and the same was true 65 million years ago, said Thomas Holtz, a paleontologist at the University of Maryland who was not part of the study.
"That's food that doesn't fight back," Holtz said. "Why pass up a free meal?"
The hadrosaur vertebrae were dug up during a 2007 excavation meant to study Hell Creek's prehistoric ecology.
Robert Feeney, an amateur paleontologist with the Palm Beach Museum of Natural History in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., noticed two long bones protruding from the ground. Further excavation revealed a cauliflower-like outgrowth fusing the soup-bowl-sized vertebrae together ? a sign of bone healing.
After transporting the fossil to the University of Kansas in Lawrence, they used fine brushes, delicately-tipped dental instruments and a miniature sandblaster with baking soda to remove the remaining sediment. Then the researchers made another discovery: a tooth crown wedged between the vertebrae and surrounded by the healed bone growth.
"It was a very exciting moment," Burnham said.
The significance of the find was immediately apparent, he added: "We felt like the king was back."
The team members used a CT scanner to image the tooth crown and then measured its serrations and other characteristics. The measurements matched up with T. rex teeth.
The team used a similar approach to identify the vertebrae, comparing their size and shape to those of other plant-eating species. The long spinal processes, extensions of bone branching from the vertebrae, were characteristic of hadrosaurs.
They also determined that the vertebrae came from the hadrosaur's tail. That is consistent with the way modern-day predators attack their prey, immobilizing their victims by targeting the hindquarters first, the authors wrote.
Jack Horner, a Montana State University paleontologist who was not part of the study, said he was still not convinced that T. rex was a predator. The location of the large tooth on the underside of the hadrosaur vertebrae could indicate that the victim was lying down when it was attacked. Perhaps the T. rex mistook it for carrion and then fled once it realized its intended meal was still alive, he said.
The authors of the study can conclude only that the T. rex "bit a live animal, and the animal lived," Horner said.
Study leader Robert DePalma, a paleontologist at the Palm Beach Museum of Natural History, said Horner's scenario was "implausible."
"A scavenger doesn't come across a food source and realize all of a sudden that it's alive," he said.
Since paleontologists can't observe dinosaurs in the wild, they'll "probably never know" whether T. rex preferred scavenging or hunting, Holtz said. The new fossil "is great because, lacking time machines, we need to get tiny snapshots of info when we can."
"Not all the best fossils are totally complete specimens," he added. "Sometimes it's the little bones that count."
Brain discovery could help schizophrenicsPublic release date: 15-Jul-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Andy Henion henion@msu.edu 517-355-3294 Michigan State University
EAST LANSING, Mich. The discovery of brain impairment in mice may eventually lead to better therapies for people with schizophrenia and major depression.
Studying rodents that have a gene associated with mental illness, Michigan State University neuroscientist Alexander Johnson and colleagues found a link between a specific area of the prefrontal cortex, and learning and behavioral deficits.
While much work needs to be done, the discovery is a major step toward better understanding mental illness. While antipsychotic drugs can treat hallucinations related to schizophrenia, there essentially is no treatment for other symptoms such as lack of motivation or anhedonia, the inability to experience pleasure.
"This study may well suggest that if we start targeting these brain-behavior mechanisms in people with mental illness, it may help to alleviate some of the cognitive and motivational symptoms, which to date remain largely untreated with current drug therapies," said Johnson, MSU assistant professor of psychology.
The study is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Schizophrenia, a disabling brain disorder marked by paranoia and hearing voices that aren't there, affects some 2.4 million Americans and runs in families, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.
The researchers conducted a series of experiments with two groups of mice those with the gene associated with mental illness and those without the gene (or the control group).
In one experiment, related to cognition, the mice were presented with tasty food when they responded on one side of a conditioning box. After repeated feedings, the food was switched to the other side of the box. The mice with the mental illness gene had a much more difficult time learning to adapt to the new side.
In another experiment, related to motivation, the mice had to respond an increasing number of times each time they wanted food. By the end of the three-hour session, all mice with the mental illness gene stopped responding for food, while half of the control group continued on.
Johnson said the deficiencies may suggest a problem in the prefrontal cortex area known as the orbitofrontal cortex, and that further research should target this area.
His co-investigators include Hanna Jaaro-Peled, Akira Sawa and Michela Gallagher from Johns Hopkins University.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Brain discovery could help schizophrenicsPublic release date: 15-Jul-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Andy Henion henion@msu.edu 517-355-3294 Michigan State University
EAST LANSING, Mich. The discovery of brain impairment in mice may eventually lead to better therapies for people with schizophrenia and major depression.
Studying rodents that have a gene associated with mental illness, Michigan State University neuroscientist Alexander Johnson and colleagues found a link between a specific area of the prefrontal cortex, and learning and behavioral deficits.
While much work needs to be done, the discovery is a major step toward better understanding mental illness. While antipsychotic drugs can treat hallucinations related to schizophrenia, there essentially is no treatment for other symptoms such as lack of motivation or anhedonia, the inability to experience pleasure.
"This study may well suggest that if we start targeting these brain-behavior mechanisms in people with mental illness, it may help to alleviate some of the cognitive and motivational symptoms, which to date remain largely untreated with current drug therapies," said Johnson, MSU assistant professor of psychology.
The study is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Schizophrenia, a disabling brain disorder marked by paranoia and hearing voices that aren't there, affects some 2.4 million Americans and runs in families, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.
The researchers conducted a series of experiments with two groups of mice those with the gene associated with mental illness and those without the gene (or the control group).
In one experiment, related to cognition, the mice were presented with tasty food when they responded on one side of a conditioning box. After repeated feedings, the food was switched to the other side of the box. The mice with the mental illness gene had a much more difficult time learning to adapt to the new side.
In another experiment, related to motivation, the mice had to respond an increasing number of times each time they wanted food. By the end of the three-hour session, all mice with the mental illness gene stopped responding for food, while half of the control group continued on.
Johnson said the deficiencies may suggest a problem in the prefrontal cortex area known as the orbitofrontal cortex, and that further research should target this area.
His co-investigators include Hanna Jaaro-Peled, Akira Sawa and Michela Gallagher from Johns Hopkins University.
###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
CLEVELAND (AP) ? Some guys have all the luck, and a little skill, too.
One fan at Sunday's game between the Cleveland Indians and Kansas City Royals at Progressive Field grabbed four foul balls, a once-in-several-lifetimes achievement.
Greg Van Niel, a season-ticket holder who wasn't sitting in his usual seat, got the four souvenirs during the Indians' 6-4 win.
"Three of them were catches and one was a ball I picked up off the ground," Van Niel told the team. "The third one I think was the hardest one ? I think I ended up sprawled across a few rows, and I got some cheese on myself. But the other ones were just a matter of being in the right place at the right time."
Yeah, four times.
Van Niel described one of his grabs, on a ball hit by Indians leadoff man Michael Bourn, as being highlight-reel worthy.
"Michael Bourn hit one that was off the fa?ade, and that's where I was in the cheese fries," he said. "(That) one was crazy acrobatics. I was strewn across three rows, and I needed some assistance getting back."
Van Niel posed for a picture for the Indians clutching three of the souvenirs in his right hand. He said he had never caught a foul ball before his amazing one-day haul.
There were 15,431 other fans at the Indians' final game before the All-Star break, but it's safe to bet none had a day quite like Van Niel.
MANEA Gala promised much and delivered more with a parade drenched in mid summer heat and providing a visually stunning display of good natured, beautifully turned out floats.
The hard working committee members who spent months preparing for this should be congratulated for devising a spectacular show deserving of the warm applause that it received.
It was a parade that drew an eclectic mix of floats which put together, catapulted Manea into the X Factor finale of village carnivals.
From vintage to modern tractors, from scooters to Scanias, from furiously pedalling ice cream vendors to hand drawn vintage fire pumps, it was a cavalcade of riches.
And if favourites there had to be, surely the Newfoundland dogs were up there with the best of them.
The dogs belong to a society formed 24 years ago to preserve their breed but more importantly to always be there to put on a show. Their fund raising for charity is legendary, for example each December they pull Christmas trees for customers in Thetford Forest and take them back to people?s cars for a donation.
The floats too oozed pride and passion- and reflected much hard work and preparation.
Though The Stig looked surprisingly comfortable in his car, as did MP Steve Barclay who ?hitched? a carnival ride in a Bentley, in reality it was the kids wot won it.
They embraced the parade in substantial numbers, ensuring no doubt a gala first begun in 1954 is in good hands for the next generation or two of Manea villagers.
Pay is, of course, becoming a lot more complex in the financial sector and investment banks are keen to build their internal compensation teams in order to meet the demands of both employees and regulators. There?s just one problem ? there are not enough people available.
Investment banks are slowly building their compensation teams in order to both navigate the tricky new regulatory environment and ensure that pay remains competitive relative to their peers. Banks employ specialists in deferred compensation, equity payments, international tax, and regulatory remuneration issues as well as those tasked with working out cash payments.
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?Banks are building their compensation teams,? said Claire Hodgson, senior consultant for HR at recruiters Morgan McKinley. ?The main challenges banks face attracting talent is that there is currently a lack of candidates for compensation roles in the market. Attracting candidates for these roles is difficult as they?re not actively looking.?
These roles are surprisingly well-paid, considering that they sit in an HR function. One compensation consultant working for a Big Four firm, said that they pay ?a fraction of what people earn in the investment banks? for an equivalent role.
After three years? experience, ?60-80k is the normal salary range, he suggests, while a head of reward for a European bank should expect over ?250k and a head of deferred compensation can earn over ?150k. Across financial services, figures from Robert Walters suggest a ?100-200k average for a head of compensation and benefits and ?75-100k for a compensation and benefits manager.
Citigroup, Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley all have open roles in this area.
So, why are these people so hard to find? It?s not just a supply and demand issue: ?One problem is that people are pigeon-holed into particular specialism early in their career, which is not conducive longer term to offering the step up to a senior position with a more general compensation focus,? said the compensation consultant.?Banks are also likely to look externally for the more complex advice, which doesn?t make in-house staff feel overly-valued.?
Junior investment bankers in the front office burning the midnight oil may disagree, but it?s also something of a gruelling position to work in. It?s common to work at least 60 hours a week, and you can add another 20 as compensation cycles looms. ?It?s a hugely stressed and pressurised environment, which you can only remain in for so long,? said the compensation consultant. Therefore, people either go it alone, or move into a consultancy, he said.
Ironically, perhaps, in the past two years or so that the job has become much more interesting, with the regulators spicing up the complexity of the role by changing compensation within investment banking so much.
?Investment banks are having to extend their search beyond the sector ? consultancies are happy hunting grounds, but so are retail banks and insurance firms,? said the compensation expert.