Curso de PaleoArte no Museu da Lourinhã

The Museum of Lourinhã anounces the workshop PaleoArt Teaching - 2010 em Português Overview The Italian painter Fabio Pastori, winner of the 6ª CIID - International Contest of Dinosaur Illustration - (amongst 71 artists, of 22 countries) and professor Jordan Nenna, illustrator and cartoonist, specialized in computer aided drawing techniques, will host, under the sponsorship of GEAL - Museu da Lourinhã, a brand new summer class which they have named as PaleoArt Teaching - The Complete Lost World Journey. During the course of nine days, students will have the opportunity to know the Museum, do field prospecting for fossils, learn and live with renowned artists, and those who search scientific illustration and painting know-how. Fabio Pastori: www.fabiopastori.it Jordan Nenna: jordannennaart.deviantart.com see more information More info at Museu da Lourinhã http://www.jurassicparkitalia.it/paleoart-teaching/home.html

Following in heroes' footsteps

“The unhappy officer, the revered winner of Chaimite, the celebrated captor of Gungunhana, has just commited suicide” [translated from Portuguese: “O desditoso oficial, o chorado vencedor de Chaimite, o celebrado captor de Gungunhana, tinha acabado de se suicidar”] (Jornal O Século, 1902). It is a condemnation that the history of heroes is tragic: Joaquim Mouzinho de Almeida was an intrepid explorer of Mozambique that captured one of the most redoubtable tribal leaders that fought against Portuguese colonial forces. It will not be like Mouzinho de Almeida that we are going to Mozambique this year, but it is with the exact same spirit of mission and curiosity to understand something else about our own life by capturing a picture of what happened 250 million years ago.



I am Portuguese. My hero is not Livingstone that explored the region of the Great African Lakes; it is Serpa Pinto who honored the Lisbon Administration by going far East away from the Angolan Coast. Without him the Portuguese Overseas African Territory would be small, and, what is nowadays Angola would be only a thin strip of land along the coast. In my language we do not say Lake Malawi; Lake Niassa it is how it is called.

It is interesting that with such legacy the Portuguese people are irredeemably pessimistic and we do not value our national conquests. In the same way Mouzinho de Almeida has fallen into disgrace, what was once called the Portuguese Empire it is now reduced to a 10-million country in the Iberian Peninsula. That is not necessarily bad, it is just not inspiring. To know and value our History it is a good excuse to make good (great!) things as well.

The PaleoAngola project does not have behind the heroes that will write the pages of the History textbooks, but it certainly holds the dream of discovery, the passion of exploration, the fierceness of those who can envision beyond a cloudy sky. Initially a group of four people, that still form the hardcore of the group, acknowledged the great potential for Vertebrate Paleontology along the Angolan coast. They are Louis Jacobs and Mike Polcyn from SMU, Octávio Mateus from Museu da Lourinhã (Portugal) and Anne Schulp from Natuurhistorisch Museum Maastricht (The Netherlands). The omnipresent figure of Paleontology in Portugal, Miguel Telles Antunes, back in the 1960’s had done his PhD on vertebrate material collected from Cabinda (the northernmost Angolan Province) to Cunene (the southernmost river that limits the border with Namibia). Angola at that time was still part of the Portuguese Overseas Territory, whereas most African colonies were already independent. Antunes studies revealed, most importantly, new species of mosasaurs, a type of large marine lizards. However, for nearly half a century, nearly no new work was published. In fact, most of Antunes material was collected during the pioneering geological recognition campaigns in Angola. Thus, excepting in 1961 and 1962 Antunes trips to the coast of Angola, virtually no other vertebrate paleontologists had stepped that country’s soil.

In 2005 what was initially aimed to be a diplomatic trip, Louis Jacobs and Octávio Mateus, travelled to Luanda and decided to visit one of the outcrops just out of curiosity… They just found the first dinosaur from Angola, a new species of turtle and a complete skull of one of Antunes’ species. Not bad for a first try! Evidently giving this success there was subsequent trips in 2006 and 2007. In 2007 more than one ton of fossils were shipped.
Mike, Louis, Octávio, and Anne did not fought against any tenacious tribal leader as Mouzinho de Almeida, but with the same tenacity have just unearthed, pacifically, how life looked like more than 65 million years ago in the South Atlantic... when Africa west coast and South America east coast were much closer, when dinosaurs could not even guess how much a meteorite could harm. Would Caesar ever think that his troops could not hold the Roman Empire together? Would the King D. João V during the construction of the megalomaniac Convento de Mafra in Portugal could ever anticipate the country’s economical collapse? Life oscillates on Earth as did the Great Empires; mosasaurs and dinosaurs are now entombed.

The weight on my shoulders is heavy. The mission that has been appointed to me is to find, excavate and study the remains of marine creatures called plesiosaurs. Plesiosaurs resemble the mythological animal that patrols a lake in Scotland: the Loch Ness Monster.

The intentions of the Portuguese were hampered by the powerful British Empire. Once the Portuguese wished to link coast to coast in Africa (Mozambique to Angola), but those intents were readily frustrated given the British interests in the area. The “Pink Map”, how it was called, was then no more than a mirage. This year on my trip to Africa I will make the Pink Map come true, flying from Luanda to Maputo, linking them by the same paleontological endeavor. In 2009, Rui Castanhinha and I, two just-graduates from Portuguese universities have decided with our own pocket money and savings (and some support from Museu da Lourinhã) revisit a long-lost Mozambican fossil locality in the remote region of Niassa, right along Lake Malawi. After a lot of hand-shaking work and promises of a successful trip we got the administrative support from the Museu Nacional de Geologia de Moçambique and Universidade Eduardo Mondlane. However, that was not enough, the money of our savings together was not even enough to rent a car for one day in Mozambique. On a desperate attempt we decided to call the Ministry of Transports who gave us a contact from an administrative agency from the Niassa Province who could probably support us logistically. We went to Niassa without any prospect that we could actually get to see the geological exposures… But, the Mozambican people demonstrated all their generosity when we came and our trip was a success. We found more than 10 localities with abundant fossil material to be salvaged and a nearly complete skeleton of a minute synapsid (mammal common ancestors). Niassa was shown to us in all its mystery and splendor. Our local guide, Luís Macuango, fought against the colonial Portuguese to conquer the independence and right for self-determination of Mozambique; and our driver, Ângelo Madrugas, has fought on the Mozambican Civil War that opposed the communist party Frelimo and the pro-colonialists Renamo when he was still a child. They formed two generations of warriors, after being themselves heroes, honored us with their help exploring the banks of the Lunho River in Niassa. Luís Macuango is the brother of the highly influential and witch Queen of Muchenga. One night after many frustrated days of slim findings I asked him to pray for us, he just said: “Amanhã vamos andar bem”, which means “Tomorrow we will walk good”. In the next day we hit the jackpot.

Pode tambem ver em Student Adventures.

Lançamento de livro sobre Museus de Geologia

Convidamos todos os interessados para o lançamento do livro "Colecções e museus de Geologia: missão e gestão" no dia 23 de Junho de 2010, pelas 18:00, na Academia de Ciências de Lisboa.

R. da Academia das Ciências, 19 - 1249-122 Lisboa
Tel: 213 219 730
http://www.acad-ciencias.pt/http://sites.google.com/site/geocoleccoes/


Brandão, J.M., Callapez, P.M., Mateus, O. & Castro, P. 2010. Colecções e museus de Geologia: missão e gestão. Universidade de Coimbra e Centro de Estudos e Filosofia da História da Ciência.

Lourinhanosaurus antunesi, visto por Sergey Krasovskiy

Nova ilustração do dinossauro terópode da Lourinhã, o Lourinhanosaurus antunesi, desenhado pelo artista Russo Sergey Krasovskiy.

Interview: Ricardo Araújo on Journal of Paleontological Techniques

Interview: Ricardo Araújo on Journal of Paleontological Techniques

Post Mirrored from The Open Source Paleontologist by Andy

Fossil preparators are the unsung heroes of paleontology. For every paper on a spectacular Archaeopteryxskeleton, or an exquisite new ceratopsian skull, there is at least one talented preparator who freed the fossil from its rocky tomb. Despite the importance of preparators for paleontology, there are surprisingly few formal publications devoted to the trade (beyond the occasional symposium volume). Even rarer are open access publications on fossil preparation. Thus, it is a real pleasure to share this interview with Ricardo Araújo, the executive editor for Journal of Paleontological Techniques.

Tell us a little about Journal of Paleontological Techniques. How did the journal get started?
The Journal of Paleontological Techniques got started due to the difficulties that we felt in the Museu da Lourinha (in Portugal) to get access information relative to preparation. Unfortunately it is extremely hard for a peripheral country to have access to the know-how developed in the great centers of knowledge, namely central Europe and the US. So, we had to find an economical way without detriment of scientific rigor; publishing and editing articles using an open access philosophy seemed the right solution. Furthermore, the lack of a systematic compilation of paleontological techniques is evident in the literature.

What makes Journal of Paleontological Techniques unique?
There are a few things that make our journal unique:

1. There is no other journal focused on the practical side of paleontology. Some typical paleontological journals publish sporadically on paleontological techniques, and there are a handful of printed publications. However, there is an immense quantity of knowledge acquired by generations of preparators that is hard to access if you cannot go to the main conferences or workshops.
2. Also, preparation is practical in its essence. Thus, our papers can include videos and as many photos as necessary to make a technique easily perceptible. Most of the time it is difficult to express these techniques in words.
3. Our publications are edited in volumes. Each article is published by itself as a volume, which decreases the total amount of time for publication. This flexibility allows us, for example, to publish annals of congresses or symposia.
4. Our journal is totally open access and double-blind peer-reviewed. This doesn’t make our journal unique but certainly a “rare specimen.”

What advice would you give to authors who are interested in submitting their manuscripts to JPT?
Write! The preparation community is not used to writing about their findings, some of which are extremely important and can save thousands of euros for paleontological institutions. To spread paleontological techniques is to advance paleontology as a whole. Preparation is a science as well, in its most Popperian essence. To test and refute paleontological techniques is possible, and in fact, is done by all preparators everyday when we use different products, methods and tools, striving for the best way to do something efficiently.

What kind of difficulties, if any, have you encountered in editing JPT? How have these been solved?
When we embraced this project we quickly realized that the challenge was not to create the space to publish practical-paleontological ideas, but almost to change the status quo that preparators face nowadays. Institutions hire preparators to prepare fossils, not to write scientific articles. However, to my eyes, that is a rather limited view about the role of preparation. Preparation is the technical side of paleontology, and like any other science paleontology has its own methods—methods that are publishable. Actually, methods that are required to be published. Moreover, thinking strictly in an economic perspective, by spreading this sort of knowledge, preparator’s employers will quickly realize that they can save money by KNOWING and SHARING their knowledge.

In order to circumvent this problem, we are trying to present at as many events related to preparation as possible, not only to publicize the journal itself but also to spread the ideas behind it. We are part of mailing lists, groups of geosciences journals, and a gazillion things like that. For every preparation-related paleontological event that we know, we try to contact the organizers in order to publish the abstracts or edit a volume with selected papers. We are currently trying to organize an opinion paper that will be submitted in a mainstream paleontological journal, about the underestimation of the importance of preparation/paleontological techniques as a legitimate science. We recently got a wave of papers submitted, and hopefully it will be sustainable.

What has been the best part of editing a journal like JPT?
What I enjoy most about this project is actually the spirit of the journal and the challenge it represents. I believe the actual scenario is difficult, but not impossible to surpass. Ideally we would like to get help and cooperation from various areas of the preparation community, starting from the preparators themselves, up to the heads of departments, and paleontologists.

Image credit: courtesy Ricardo Araújo, originally published at Palaeontologia Electronica.

Homo gautengensis, mais um irmão na família

Sejam dadas as boas-vindas a mais uma espécie de humano, o nosso irmão Homo gautengensis, descoberto em cavernas da África do Sul.

Curnoe, D. 2010. A review of early Homo in southern Africa focusing on cranial, mandibular and dental remains, with the description of a new species (Homo gautengensis sp. nov.). HOMO - Journal of Comparative Human Biology

The southern African sample of early Homo is playing an increasingly important role in understanding the origins, diversity and adaptations of the human genus. Yet, the affinities and classification of these remains continue to be in a state of flux. The southern African sample derives from five karstic palaeocave localities and represents more than one-third of the total African sample for this group; sampling an even wider range of anatomical regions than

the eastern African collection. Morphological and phenetic comparisons of southern African specimens covering dental, mandibular and cranial remains demonstrate this sample to contain a species distinct from known early Homo taxa. The new species Homo gautengensis sp. nov. is described herein: type specimen Stw 53; Paratypes SE 255, SE 1508, Stw 19b/33, Stw 75–79, Stw 80, Stw 84, Stw 151, SK 15, SK 27, SK 45, SK 847, SKX 257/258, SKX 267/268, SKX

339, SKX 610, SKW 3114 and DNH 70. H. gautengensis is identified from fossils recovered at three palaeocave localities with current best ages spanning"2.0 to 1.26–0.82 million years BP. Thus, H. gautengensis is probably the earliest recognised species in the human genus and its longevity is apparently well in excess of H. habilis.

View curnoe-2010-homo-gautungensis-endemic-early-homo-to-s-afr-pdf

Jeyawati rugoculus

Jeyawati rugoculus

via PALAEOBLOG by Michael J. Ryan, Ph.D. on 5/27/10

Image by Lukas Panzarin

Congrats to Andrew MacDonald for describing Jeyawati rugoculus, a 91 million year old basal hadrosauroid from western New Mexico.

The partial skull and other fragments of Jeyawati were discovered by paleontologist Douglas Wolfe, principal investigator of the Zuni Basin Paleontological Project. Subsequent excavation and collection was carried out for 13 years with the aid of James Kirkland, state paleontologist with the Utah Geological Survey, and volunteers from the Southwest Paleontological Society, among others.

The research team published their findings in the May issue of the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. link

______________________________

Este post foi replicado do blog "Palaeoblog". Achei a reconstrução artística do Jeyawati absolutamente genial.

V Jornadas de Paleontologia de Dinossauros

Reproduzo aqui a informação dos colegas espanhóis sobre as:

V Jornadas Internacionales de Paleontología de Dinosaurios y su Entorno

via Fundacion Dinosaurios Cyl

Del 16 al 18 de septiembre de 2010 se celebrará en Salas de los Infantes (Burgos, España) la quinta edición de las Jornadas Internacionales de Paleontología de Dinosaurios y su Entorno.

Ya está disponible la segunda circular en la que hay incluida más información sobre la organización, el lugar del evento, el programa provisional, la preinscripción o los pagos de tasas.

En esta quinta edición se cuenta con importantes conferenciantes a nivel internacional, como:

Dra. Dª Else Mari Friss, Swedish Museum of Natural History

D. Greg Paul, Independent palaeontologist and paleoartist

Dr. D. James Farlow, Indiana University- Purdue University Fort Wayne

Dr. D. Joaquín Moratalla, Instituto Geológico y Minero de España

Dr. D. José Luis Barco, Paleoymás

Dr. D. Octavio Mateus, Universidade Nova de Lisboa

Dr. D. Paul Upchurch, University Collage London

Dr. D. Rofolfo Coria, CONICET, Museo Carmen Funes, Argentina

Toda la información en el blog creado para las V Jornadas Internacionales de Paleontología de Dinosaurios y su Entorno

Ciclo de Conferências da Biodiversidade

O BioCEL (Bio Conselho de Estudantes da Lusófona), está a organizar o Ciclo de Conferências da Biodiversidade. Estas conferências vêm no âmbito das celebrações do Ano Internacional da Biodiversidade.

Pretende-se assim organizar um ciclo de conferências onde fosse possível reunir uma grande diversidade de temas abrangendo assim vários temas da Biologia e áreas afins. O programa do Ciclo de Conferências da Biodiversidade é o seguinte:

Dia 18 de Maio—Auditório Agostinho da Silva

15H00 Biodiversidade ao longo do Tempo

Octávio Mateus (UNL/Museu da Lourinhã)

16H00 Possíveis explicações para a biodiversidade de peixes no Atlântico NE

Dr. Frederico Almada (ULHT)

Coffee Break

17H00 Acompanhamento de algumas espécies de peixes com diferentes histórias vitais na consta rochosa da Parede/S. Pedro do Estoril - Recrutamento de juvenis, abundância e crescimento

Joana Martins (ULHT)

Dia 24 de Maio—Auditório Victor de Sá

14H00 Avaliação para Portugal do Millenium Ecosystem Assessment: Os serviços dos ecossistemas em Portugal

Dra. Vânia Proença (FCUL)

15H00 Bolsas de Integração na Investigação: Análise funcional de genes de Bacillus subtilis

Joana Lopes (ULHT)

Coffee Break

16H00 Respiração e Biodiversidade

Dr. Stephane Besson (ULHT)

Dia 4 de Junho—Auditório Victor de Sá

14H00 Estudo da potencial relação da Aneuploidia com a condição fisiológica e o crescimento na Ameijoa-Boa (Ruditapes decussatus)

Joana Sousa (UNL/INRB I.P./L-IPIMAR. /ULHT)

15H00 Contributos da Falcoaria para a conservação das Aves de Rapina

Dr. Carlos Crespo (Falcoaria da Coudelaria de Alter - Fundação Alter Real)

Coffee Break

16H00 Adaptação e Biodiversidade

Dra. Teresa Avelar (ULHT)

Dia 9 de Junho—Auditório Victor de Sá

14H00 Cultivar...ou deixar arder? Dilemas da conservação da biodiversidade na região Mediterrânica

Dr. Francisco Moreira (ISA/ULHT)

15H00 Biodiversidade e taxas de extinção: ao longo da História da Terra e no presente

Dr. André Levy (ISPA)

Coffee Break

16H00 Diversidade e aplicações dos esporos bacterianos

Dr. Cláudia Serra (ITQB)

17H00 Biodiversidade: Ameaças e desafios à sobrevivência Humana

Dr. Nuno Oliveira (AmBioDiv)

Dia 16 de Junho—Auditório Agostinho da Silva

14H00 O que há de tão fantástico com a herpetofauna Ibérica?

Dr. Octávio S. Paulo (Computational Biology and Population Genomics Group/CBA/FCUL)

15H00 «Espécies» ou «Indivíduos»? - No que consiste realmente a conservação de primatas em cativeiro?

Dra. Augusta Gaspar (ISCTE)

Coffee Break

16H00 Amazónia e as Alterações Climáticas: Que implicações para a Biodiversidade

Raquel Lobo Vale (ISA)

Espectáculo "Walking with Dinosaurs"

Durante este fim de semana, está patente o espectáculo "Walking with dinosaurs" no Pavilhão Atlântico, em Lisboa.

Os movimentos estão muito realistas e bem conseguidos. Vale a pena ver.

O Museu da Lourinhã é parceiro deste espectáculo.

Estatística europeia de recursos humanos na Ciência

Mais estatística do desempenho de Portugal e de outros países (sobretudo europeus) na Ciência, nomeadamente a percentagem dos resursos humanos em Ciência (gráfico de cima) e estudantes de doutoramento (gráfico de baixo).


Human resources in science and technology as a share of labour force - Total - (%)
Short Description: Human resources in science and technology (HRST) as a share of the economically active population in the age group 25-64. This indicator gives the percentage of the total labour force in the age group 25-64, that is classified as HRST, i.e. having either successfully completed an education at the third level in an S&T field of study or is employed in an occupation where such an education is normally required. HRST are measured mainly using the concepts and definitions laid down in the Canberra Manual, OECD, Paris, 1995.


Doctorate students in science and technology fields - Total
(% of the population aged 20-29)Students participating in second stage of tertiary education in science and technology.

A estatística refere-se aos dados mais recentes disponíveis.
Fonte: Eurostat.

Artigo sobre estegossauro Miragaia

O artigo no Proceedings of Royal Society B foi destacado como um dos 10 artigos mais descarregados e citados em 2009, ficando agora disponível gratuitamente, numa selecção feita pela própria revista:

Selecção dos mais citados e descarregados: http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/site/misc/top_cites_and_downloads.xhtml

Artigo http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/276/1663/1815

Octávio Mateus,

Susannah C.R. Maidment and

Nicolai A. Christiansen. 2009.

A new long-necked ‘sauropod-mimic’ stegosaur and the evolution of the plated dinosaurs. Proceedings of Royal Society B

Miragaia longicollum, por Filipe Alves Elias, (CIID 2009, Museu da Lourinhã)

Aula Abertas de Biologia do Desenvolvimento e Evolução, no ISPA

O ISPA (Inst. Superior de Psicologia Aplicada) tem aulas abertas de Biologia do Desenvolvimento e Evolução. No dia 5 (quarta-feira) pelas 18:30 e dia 6 (quinta-feira) pelas 8:30 será a minha deixa com palestras sobre "Dinossauros do Jurássico Superior de Portugal".

Por serem "Aulas Abertas", estão todos convidados.

Investimento na Ciência em Portugal

Gráfico da percentagem da despesa dos países europeus (e outros) em Ciência e Tecnologia, em função do Produto Interno Bruto. Portugal está num desapontante 24º lugar (em 34 países) e bem abaixo da média europeia.

Fonte: Eurostat.

Tabela crono-estratigráfica portuguesa 2010

A GeoPor acaba de anunciar o trabalho pelos paleontólogos João Pais e Rogério Rocha do CICEGe (Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia da Universidade Nova de Lisboa) com o quadro de divisões estratigráficas(tabela crono) e tentativa de uniformização da nomenclatura cronoestratigráfica, usando terminologia portuguesa segundo as convenções internacionais e a cronologia mais recente (GTS 2009).

Indispensável para qualquer paleontólogo!

Link.

PDF.

Filme "Sea Rex 3D"

Mais um "trailer" de um filme a não perder: Sea Rex 3D. Com plesiossauros, mosassauros e outros aspectos dos mares mesozóicos.

Creation

"Creation" é o nome do filme que retrata a vida de Charles Darwin. Aqui vai o respectivo "trailer":

Rochedos extraordinários

Fotografias de alguns dos mais extraordinários rochedos do mundo:

Infelizmente não fui o autor destas fotos. Recebi-as via email, pelo que não consigo citar os créditos de quem fotografou.

Corvus sapiens sapiens

Este fantástico video acompanha o recente artigo "Complex cognition and behavioural innovation in New Caledonian crows" publicado na Proc. R. Soc. B, por uma equipa da Universidade de Auckland e também disponível aqui.

O caçador de fósseis Kirby Siber recebe Honoris Causa

O meu amigo Hans-Jacob Siber, mais conhecido por Kirby Siber, é um excelente caçador de fósseis de dinossauros e outros animais, de tal forma que criou um museu de paleontologia numa pequena vila (Aathal) nos arredores de Zurique.
É precisamente a universidade desta cidade que lhe confere hoje o título de Doutor Honoris Causa.
Diz o site http://idw-online.de/de/news365687: "A dignidade de um doutorado honorário concedido pela Faculdade de Matemática e Ciências Naturais é dada a Hans Jakob Siber em reconhecimento à sua contribuição para a investigação dos dinossauros. Ser apreciado tanto pelas significativas escavações científicas, bem como pelo museu de dinossauros em Aathal"

O Kirby e sua equipa são responsáveis pela descoberta de dezenas de fósseis, incluindo da maior tartaruga do mundo, a Archelon, do dinossauro Allosaurus Big Al 1, e Big Al 2, e de fantásticos esqueletos quase completos como o de Camarasaurus (post), que estive estudando em Aathal em Março passado.

Parabéns Kirby!