Antarctic Dinosaurs

If you get a chance to see this traveling exhibit, do so! It was developed by the Field Museum in Chicago and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles. It is currently in residence at the Natural History Museum of Utah.

 

The whole idea that dinosaurs once stomped around Antarctica sort of blows my mind. Of course, it was warmer in the Jurassic and Cretaceous, but it was still dark for three months of the year. This exhibit features discoveries from various Antarctic expeditions over the last century, with techniques, equipment, video footage, reconstructed critters, and mounted skeletons.

Okay, this doesn't look like much but it's a fossil tree, Glossopteris. The ill-fated Terra Nova expedition of 1910-1913 carried 40 pounds of fossils along even as they were dying of exposure and starvation, because of the importance of these fossils. This tree was spread across Pangea and proves continental drift--Antarctica was once attached to South America, Africa, and Australia.

Reuniting Pangea

Kryostega skull

Posing with Antarctosuchus, a really big carnivorous amphibian (245 million years ago)

 

Smiling Antarctosuchus

Lystrosaurus, a proto-mammal that survived the end-Permian mass extinction

Cryolophosaurus (cryo = ice, lopho = crest, saurus = lizard) had a funny crest crosswise across its forehead. It's thought that they used it for species signaling to mates or rivals.

Cryolophosaurus

Me and my pal, Cryo

Cryolophosaurus lived in Antarctica ~190 million years ago. It wasn't as cold then, but still chilly and dark for three months of the year.

CT scan of the skull reveals the braincase and size/shape of brain regions.

"Sauropodomorph A" hasn't officially been named yet but was an early version of long-necked dinos.

Jumble of "Sauropodomorph A" bones that are too fragile to extract from the stone matrix, but they were CT scanned and then...

...3D printed from the CT scan to reconstruct the skeleton.