In 1990 her skeleton was found, virtually complete, in what many have called the most spectacular dinosaur fossil discovery to date.And then another battle began -- a "survival of the fittest" free-for-all involving commercial dinosaur hunters, gun-toting law officers, an ambitious federal prosecutor, a Native American tribe, jealous academics, an enterprising auction house, major museums, and corporate giants, all making their claim for the dinosaur named Sue. Before it was over, there would be claims and counterclaims; charges of checkbook-polluted science, criminal larceny, and vengeful prosecutions; and devastating prison terms. And the gavel would come down on the largest-ever ($8.36 million) auction price tag for a fossil, paid by Chicago's Field Museum, with help from Disney and McDonald's.Capturing the whole range of characters and issues embroiled in the fight for Sue, Steve Fiffer communicates both the excitement over Sue's discovery and the motivations, maneuverings, and absurdities of the various forces attempting to control her destiny.

    They made the world theirs long before the rise of dinosaurs. Travelling forward into the Permian and then Triassic periods, we learn how our ancient mammal ancestors evolved from large hairy beasts with accelerating metabolisms to exploit miniaturisation, which was key to unlocking the traits that define mammals as we now know them. Elsa criss-crosses the globe to explore the sites where discoveries are being made and meet the people who make them. In Scotland, she traverses the desert dunes of prehistoric Moray, where quarry workers unearthed the footprints of Permian creatures from before the time of dinosaurs. In South Africa, she introduces us to animals, once called 'mammal-like reptiles', that gave scientists the first hints that our furry kin evolved from a lineage of egg-laying burrowers. In China, new, complete fossilised skeletons reveal mammals that were gliders, shovel-pawed Jurassic moles, and flat-tailed swimmers.This book radically reframes the narrative of our mammalian ancestors and provides a counterpoint to the stereotypes of mighty dinosaur overlords and cowering little mammals. It turns out the earliest mammals weren't just precursors, they were pioneers.

    In this exciting book, paleontologist Phillip Manning presents the most astonishing dinosaur fossil excavations of the past 100 years—including the recent discovery of a remarkably intact dinosaur mummy in the Badlands of North Dakota. Bone structure is just the beginning of our knowledge today, thanks to amazing digs like these. Drawing on new breakthroughs and cutting-edge techniques of analysis, Dr. Manning takes us on a thrilling, globe-spanning tour of dinosaur mummy finds—from the first such excavation in 1908 to a baby dinosaur unearthed in 1980, from a dino with a heart in South Dakota to titanosaur embryos in Argentina. And he discusses his own groundbreaking analysis of "Dakota," discovered by Tyler Lyson. Using state-of-the-art technology to scan and analyse this remarkable discovery, National Geographic and Dr. Manning create an incredibly lifelike portrait of Dakota. The knowledge to be gained from this exceedingly rare find, and those that came before it, will intrigue dinosaur-loving readers of all ages.

    Learning all the tongue twisting names, picking favorites based on ferocity, armor, or sheer size. For many kids this love of ‘terrible lizards’ fizzles out at some point between starting and leaving primary school. All those fancy names slowly forgotten, no longer any need for a favorite.For all those child dino fanatics who didn’t grow up to become paleontologists, dinosaurs seem like something out of mythology. They are dragons, pictures in books, abstract, other, extinct.They are at the same time familiar and mysterious. And yet we’re in an age of rapid discovery—new dinosaur species and genera are being discovered at an accelerating rate, we’re learning more about what they looked like, how they lived, how they evolved and where they all went.This series isn’t just a top trumps list of dino facts—we’re interested in the why and the how and like all areas of science there is plenty of controversy and debate.

    

    But how much do these types of entertainment really tell us about recent scientific discoveries and the latest research into the world of the dinosaur?This is the first book explain how scientists have been able to put together a picture of how dinosaurs looked, what they ate, and how they moved and interacted with each other. Taking a new approach to the subject, David Norman combines different areas of science, such as anatomy, genetics, forensics, and engineering design, to piece together the latest evidence of how animal life evolved on earth. Norman engagingly lays out the history of dinosaur research, from the speculation over ancient myths about dragons, to the latest virtual reality animation sequences and engineering design analysis. He also discusses the role that informed speculation and luck has played in many of the major discoveries.This book is a fantastic introduction for those just beginning to take an interest in dinosaurs and a must-read for true dinosaur-lovers who want to know not just the latest theories and discoveries, but how scientists achieved them.

    The second half of the nineteenth century -- the so-called Gilded Age -- was a time when Americans were exploring the West and building a nation that would stretch from coast to coast.It was also a time of scientific ferment. Charles Darwin had shaken the very foundations of Victorian society with his theory of evolution by natural selection, and scientists across the civilized world were locked in a great battle over Darwin's idea. While the debate raged in Europe, the hunt for hard evidence increasingly focused on the American West, with its grand mesas, buttes, and badlands. "We must turn to the New World if we wish to see in perfection the oldest monuments of earth's history," advised Sir Charles Lyell, the father of modern geology, after a visit to America. "Certainly in no other country are these ancient strata developed on a grander scale or more plentifully charged with fossils."Could the answer to the history of life and the proof of evolution be found in those fossils? That was the question that two young American paleontologists--Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh--set out to answer. But what began as a friendly contest quickly turned into bitter rivalry that would spill over into American science and politics and rage relentlessly for nearly three decades.        Cope and Marsh would battle on the prairies, in the halls of Congress, in science journals, and in the popular press. Both wealthy men, they launched lavish, western expeditions and raced across the plains and mountains searching for the remains of the magnificent beasts that once inhabited the continent. Along the way they would encounter George Custer, Sitting Bull, Buffalo Bill, and Red Cloud.         Among the most remarkable fossil discoveries of Cope and Marsh are a bevy of dinosaurs, including some of the best known beasts -- the Triceratops, the Stegosaurus, the Camarasaurus, and the Brontosaurus. Even today, Marsh holds the record for dinosaur discoveries.        Just as valuable, however, were some of Marsh's discoveries of ancient mammals and birds that provided the first real proof of Dar- win's theory--"The best support for the theory in twenty years," the great Darwin himself proclaimed.        The tale of Cope and Marsh is also the story of the rise of American science. When their story begins just after the Civil War, America was an intellectual backwater, with eminent scientists snookered by the great, fake stone statue The Cardiff Giant--a hoax unmasked by Marsh.        But even as Cope and Marsh waged war, they both fought to build up American science and its scientific institutions. Yet despite their discoveries and their Gilded Age celebrity, the names of Cope and Marsh have faded into the recesses of the library and archive. In The Gilded Dinosaur Mark Jaffe exhumes from those archives the notes, journals, and letters of Cope and Marsh to reanimate and retell one of the keenest rivalries in the history of science.

    However, their impact has not been limited to debates about geology and evolution: attempts to explain their existence has shaken religion at its very roots, and they have remained a subject of ceaseless fascination for people of all ages and backgrounds. In this readable and wide-ranging book, Keith Thomson provides a remarkably all-encompassing explanation of fossils as a phenomenon. How did Darwin use fossils to support his theory of evolution? What are living fossils? What fossils will we leave behind for future generations to examine? Beyond the scientific aspects, Thomson highlights the impact of fossils on philosophy and mythology, our concept of time, and today's popular culture. From the black market to the Piltdown Man, and from mythological dragons to living dinosaurs, fossils hold a permanent place in the popular imagination.

    Many were fantastic, bizarre creatures that still capture our imagination: the super-predator Tyrannosaurus, the plate-backed Stegosaurus, and the long-necked, long-tailed Diplodocus. Dinosaurs: The Ultimate Guide to How They Lived taps into our enduring interest in dinosaurs, shedding new light on different dinosaur groups. Leading paleontology experts Darren Naish and Paul Barrett trace the evolution, anatomy, biology, ecology, behavior, and lifestyle of a variety of dinosaurs. They also remind us that dinosaurs are far from extinct: they present evidence supporting the evolution of dinosaurs to birds that exist today as approximately ten thousand different species. Throughout their narrative Naish and Barrett reveal state-of-the-art new findings shaping our understanding of dinosaurs. Readers will discover, for example, how the use of CT-scanning enables scientists to look inside dinosaur skulls, thus gaining new insight into their brains and sense organs. Dinosaurs is a must-have for all those wanting to keep up to date about these dynamic, complicated creatures.

    In his groundbreaking Before the Dawn, Wade reveals humanity's origins as never before--a journey made possible only recently by genetic science, whose incredible findings have answered such questions as: What was the first human language like? How large were the first societies, and how warlike were they? When did our ancestors first leave Africa, and by what route did they leave? By eloquently solving these and numerous other mysteries, Wade offers nothing less than a uniquely complete retelling of a story that began 500 centuries ago.

    Line drawings and black-and-white photographs.

    And before there were fish in the sea, there were cephalopods - the ancestors of modern squid and Earth’s first truly substantial animals. Cephalopods became the first creatures to rise from the seafloor, essentially inventing the act of swimming. With dozens of tentacles and formidable shells, they presided over an undersea empire for millions of years. But when fish evolved jaws, the ocean’s former top predator became its most delicious snack. Cephalopods had to step up their game. Many species streamlined their shells and added defensive spines, but these enhancements only provided a brief advantage. Some cephalopods then abandoned the shell entirely, which opened the gates to a flood of evolutionary innovations: masterful camouflage, fin-supplemented jet propulsion, perhaps even dolphin-like intelligence. Squid Empire is an epic adventure spanning hundreds of millions of years, from the marine life of the primordial ocean to the calamari on tonight’s menu. Anyone who enjoys the undersea world—along with all those obsessed with things prehistoric—will be interested in the sometimes enormous, often bizarre creatures that ruled the seas long before the first dinosaurs.

    Hazen writes of how the co-evolution of the geosphere and biosphere—of rocks and living matter—has shaped our planet into the only one of its kind in the Solar System, if not the entire cosmos.With an astrobiologist’s imagination, a historian’s perspective, and a naturalist’s passion for the ground beneath our feet, Hazen explains how changes on an atomic level translate into dramatic shifts in Earth’s makeup over its 4.567 billion year existence. He calls upon a flurry of recent discoveries to portray our planet’s many iterations in vivid detail. Through his theory of “co-evolution,” we learn how reactions between organic molecules and rock crystals may have generated Earth’s first organisms, which in turn are responsible for more than two-thirds of the mineral varieties on the planet.The Story of Earth is also the story of the pioneering men and women behind the sciences. Readers will meet black-market meteorite hawkers of the Sahara Desert, the gun-toting Feds who guarded the Apollo missions’ lunar dust, and the World War II Navy officer whose super-pressurized “bomb”—recycled from military hardware—first simulated the molten rock of Earth’s mantle. As a mentor to a new generation of scientists, Hazen introduces the intrepid young explorers whose dispatches from Earth’s harshest landscapes will revolutionize geology.

    But evolutionary biologists also point out many examples of contingency, cases where the tiniest change--a random mutation or an ancient butterfly sneeze--caused evolution to take a completely different course. What role does each force really play in the constantly changing natural world? Are the plants and animals that exist today, and we humans ourselves, inevitabilities or evolutionary freaks? And what does that say about life on other planets?Jonathan Losos reveals what the latest breakthroughs in evolutionary biology can tell us about one of the greatest ongoing debates in science. He takes us around the globe to meet the researchers who are solving the deepest mysteries of life on Earth through their work in experimental evolutionary science. Losos himself is one of the leaders in this exciting new field, and he illustrates how experiments with guppies, fruit flies, bacteria, foxes, and field mice, along with his own work with anole lizards on Caribbean islands, are rewinding the tape of life to reveal just how rapid and predictable evolution can be.Improbable Destinies will change the way we think and talk about evolution. Losos's insights into natural selection and evolutionary change have far-reaching applications for protecting ecosystems, securing our food supply, and fighting off harmful viruses and bacteria. This compelling narrative offers a new understanding of ourselves and our role in the natural world and the cosmos.

    But what accounts for the incredible longevity of dinosaurs? A renowned scientist now provides a startling explanation that is rewriting the history of the Age of Dinosaurs. Dinosaurs were pretty amazing creatures--real-life monsters that have the power to fascinate us. And their fiery Hollywood ending only serves to make the story that much more dramatic. But fossil evidence demonstrates that dinosaurs survived several mass extinctions, and were seemingly unaffected by catastrophes that decimated most other life on Earth. What could explain their uncanny ability to endure through the ages? Biologist and earth scientist Peter Ward now accounts for the remarkable indestructibility of dinosaurs by connecting their unusual respiration system with their ability to adapt to Earth's changing environment--a system that was ultimately bequeathed to their descendants, birds. By tracing the evolutionary path back through time and carefully connecting the dots from birds to dinosaurs, Ward describes the unique form of breathing shared by these two distant relatives and demonstrates how this simple but remarkable characteristic provides the elusive explanation to a question that has thus far stumped scientists. Nothing short of revolutionary in its bold presentation of an astonishing theory, Out of Thin Air is a story of science at the edge of discovery. Ward is an outstanding guide to the process of scientific detection. Audacious and innovative in his thinking, meticulous and thoroughly detailed in his research, only a scientist of his caliber is capable of telling this surprising story.