Fossil Studies MDPI

09/07/2025

📢New Publication in Fossil Studies.
You are welcome to read the new article in
"On the Incompleteness of the Coelacanth Fossil Record" by Zhiwei Yuan, Lionel Cavin and Haijun Song

This study provides a comprehensive spatiotemporal analysis of the coelacanth fossil record, revealing patterns of distribution and diversity across geological periods, identifying research gaps, and emphasizing the importance of integrating fossil and phylogenetic data to inform both evolutionary understanding and conservation efforts.

https://brnw.ch/21wU0Rm

This study conducted a spatiotemporal review of the coelacanth fossil record and explored its distribution and diversity patterns. Coelacanth research can be divided into two distinct periods: the first period, which is based solely on the fossil record, and the second period following the discovery...

04/07/2025

📢 New Special Issue in is now open for submissions!

"New Directions in the Study of Vertebrate Trace Fossils"
Edited by Dr. Adrian P. Hunt, Prof. Dr. Spencer G. Lucas, and Dr. Lida Xing

We invite researchers to submit original manuscripts exploring ichnofossils, trace fossils, and innovative methodologies shaping the future of ichnology.

🗓️ Submission deadline: 28 February 2026
🔗 Submit your work here: https://brnw.ch/21wTTVV

Fossil Studies, an international, peer-reviewed Open Access journal.

17/06/2025

📢New Publication in Fossil Studies.
You are welcome to read the new article in
"Stratigraphic Position and Age of the Upper Triassic Placerias Quarry, East-Central Arizona, USA" by Spencer G. Lucas

New research reaffirms the Placerias quarry's low stratigraphic position in the Chinle Group, challenging recent zircon U/Pb dates and emphasizing the importance of integrating numerical ages with well-established litho- and biostratigraphy.

https://brnw.ch/21wTsBP

10/06/2025

🥇We're thrilled to announce the winner of the Fossil Studies 2024 Palaeontology Research Grant!

👏🏻Congratulations to Arturo Miguel Heredia, from the Instituto de Investigación en Paleobiología y Geología (IIPG), CONICET-Universidad Nacional de Río Negro, Río Negro, Argentina on winning the award!

https://brnw.ch/21wTioH

03/06/2025

📢New Publication in Studies
You are welcome to read the new article: "An Ammonite Preserved in the Upper Pliocene Lower Tejo River Deposits of Quinta Do Conde (Southwest Portugal)"
✍️by Carlos Neto de Carvalho, Miguel Barroso and Sofia Soares

This paper presents a rare and exceptional case of an ammonite fossil cast formed by gypsum through secondary diagenetic processes, revealing complex geochemical signatures and taphonomic history within Upper Pliocene quartz sandstones of the ancestral Tejo river in Portugal.

Read the full study: https://www.mdpi.com/2813-6284/3/2/8

28/05/2025

📢New Publication in
You are welcome to read the new article: "The Patagonian Mara Dolichotis patagonum (Zimmermann, 1780) (Rodentia, Caviomorpha, Caviidae) in the Late Pleistocene of Northern Uruguay: Body Mass, Paleoenvironmental and Biogeographical Connotations"

✍️by Martín Ubilla, Martín Ghizzoni and Andrés Rinderknecht

The article is a new research on a Late Pleistocene Patagonian mara skull from Uruguay reveals insights into its body size, taxonomy, and wider historic geographic range, shedding light on the species’ paleoenvironmental context in South America.

Read the full study:

The extant Patagonian mara Dolichotis patagonum (Zimmermann, 1780) is a cursorial herbivorous rodent that is hare-like in appearance. Nowadays, it occurs in some ecoregions of Argentina (28 °S–50 °S) in lowland habitats, in semi-arid thorn-scrub, in open grasslands and in shrub–land steppe. In...

26/05/2025

Article

"The Hydrodynamics of Ammonoid Swimming: Equations of Motion and Rocking Resonances"

https://www.mdpi.com/2813-6284/1/1/4

This work explores the swimming of ammonoids, cephalopods related to living squids, octopuses, and nautilids and, like the latter, equipped with a coiled external shell. A mathematical model is introduced for theoretical ammonoid conchs. The two differential equations of motion (one for the centre o...

08/05/2025

Meet Us at the Japan Geoscience Union Meeting 2025, 25–30 May 2025, Chiba, Japan

https://www.mdpi.com/about/announcements/11570

05/05/2025

📢New Publication in
You are welcome to read the new article: "Reconciling Divergent Ages for the Oldest Recorded Air-Breathing Land Animal, the Millipede, Pneumodesmus newmani Wilson & Anderson, 2004: A Review of the Geology and Ages of the Basal Old Red Sandstone Stonehaven Group (Silurian–Early Devonian), Aberdeenshire, Scotland"
✍️by Michael E. Brookfield, Elizabeth J. Catlos and Hector K. Garza

New review article explores the debate over the age of the oldest air-breathing land animal, the millipede Pneumodesmus newmani. A detailed analysis of geological data from Aberdeenshire, Scotland, resolves the conflicting mid-Silurian and latest Silurian-early Devonian ages, confirming the millipede-bearing strata as Pridoli–Lochkovian.

Read the full study: https://www.mdpi.com/2813-6284/3/2/6

Divergent mid-Silurian (late Wenlock) and latest Silurian–earliest Devonian (Pridoli–Lochkovian) ages have been proposed for the strata bearing the millipede Pneumodesmus newmani, the oldest known undoubted air-breathing land animal, marking a significant event in the evolution of the first land...

09/04/2025

Article

"First Fossil of Tylidae (Isopoda: Oniscidea) in Kachin Amber, Myanmar, with a List of All Oniscidea Fossil Records"

https://www.mdpi.com/2813-6284/1/1/3

A fossil of Oniscidea, Tylidae gen. et sp. indet. from Kachin amber (Cretaceous Cenomanian), Myanmar, is described here. The convex body, the cephalon with a triangular protrusion between the antennae, and pereonites 2–6 with epimera demarcated from tergites indicate that this specimen belongs to ...

26/03/2025

Article

"Stelladens mysteriosus: A Strange New Mosasaurid (Squamata) from the Maastrichtian (Late Cretaceous) of Morocco †"

https://www.mdpi.com/2813-6284/1/1/2



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13/03/2025

📢New Publication in
You are welcome to read the new article: "New Ornithopod Remains from the Upper Barremian (Lower Cretaceous) of Vadillos-1 (Cuenca, Spain)"
✍️by Mélani Berrocal-Casero, Fernando Barroso-Barcenilla, Pedro Miguel Callapez, Ricardo Pimentel, María Rosario Alcalde-Fuentes and Irene Prieto

This study presents the first identification of Iguanodon cf. bernissartensis in Cuenca Province, Spain, based on newly discovered remains from the Vadillos-1 site, which date to the Upper Barremian of the Lower Cretaceous. The morphological features of the sacral and ischial remains contribute valuable data to the understanding of dinosaur assemblages in the region and the paleoenvironment of the time.

https://www.mdpi.com/2813-6284/3/1/5