Who's the Culprit? Doubts Surface About Asteroid Family Believed Responsible for Dinosaur Extinction

Scientists think that a giant asteroid, which broke up long ago in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter,
eventually made its way to Earth and led to the extinction of the dinosaurs.  This artist's concept shows a broken-up
asteroid.  (Graphic by NASA/JPL-Caltech)

PASADENA, Calif. -- Observations from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission indicate the family of asteroids some believed was responsible for the demise of the dinosaurs is not likely the culprit, keeping open the case on one of Earth's greatest mysteries.

While scientists are confident a large asteroid crashed into Earth approximately 65 million years ago, leading to the extinction of dinosaurs and some other life forms on our planet, they do not know exactly where the asteroid came from or how it made its way to Earth. A 2007 study using visible-light data from ground-based telescopes first suggested the remnant of a huge asteroid, known as Baptistina, as a possible suspect.

James Black: Master Blacksmith

One early version of the famous Bowie Knife
(Photo by Ark30inf-wikipedia commons)

James (Jim) Bowie perished at the Alamo holding back Santa Anna to allow Sam Houston the time he needed to gather forces to win the Texas battle for independence from Mexico.  However, his legend and the legend of his famous knife refused to die.  While tales about the knife dubbed the "Bowie Knife" and the "Arkansas Toothpick" circulated, little was ever told about the man responsible for the design and craftsmanship behind this famous knife: James Black.  Bowie's fame can hardly hold a candle to the life experiences of Black.

Time Capsule: 80-Million-Year-Old Feathers Captured in Amber

A feather from the late Cretaceous is trapped in amber.  (Photo by the University of Alberta-the University of Alberta
does not endorse Fossil HD)

(Edmonton) Secrets from the age of the dinosaurs are usually revealed by fossilized bones, but a University of Alberta research team has turned up a treasure trove of late Cretaceous feathers, which have been discovered trapped in tree resin.

Power of the Press: How one common cartoon character summed up the American Cause

In today's high tech world of the internet, 24/7 satellite television, and smart phones, it's easy to forget what life was like before all of the gadgets entered into our lives.  At one time the local radio station was our lifeline to world news.  In the not so distant pass the post office was our social network.  Believe it or not, newspapers used to exist primarily on paper rather than on the iPad.  The times have changed.

Almost everywhere you travel these days across the United States you hear about the downfall of our society.  While many people disagree on the core issues, most agree that the news media has become too biased and polarized as well as downright nasty.  Democrats jump on Fox News for their blatant support of the Republican Party, Republicans claim that MSNBC has become the pulpit for Democrats, and others are upset with seemingly the lack of professionalism in the media as a whole.

So where have we gone wrong?  Maybe that is not the best choice of questions.  Perhaps we should be asking  "Where did we learn this behavior?"

Jacob Shallus: Penman of the United States Constitution

(Photo by Jonathunder)

When the Thirteen Original Colonies felt forced into declaring their independence from the mother country of Great Britain, the Continental Congress must have felt overwhelmed.  They had to establish a government and a set of rules for the government.  This was no small task, but add to it the fact that the nation was at war with one of the most powerful nations in the world.  The delegates to the congress feared creating a government that would simply be trading one tyrannical government for another that could be equally as bad.  This fear drove them to proceed with caution as they drafted the Articles of Confederation.  Under the Articles, the government was too weak lacking the power to tax and having no chief executive to carry out the laws.  By 1787, it was clear that something must be done.

Newborn Dinosaur Discovered In Maryland

Fossil of the baby nodosaur.
(Photo by Ray Stanford)

No, this isn't Jurassic Park. Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine with help from an amateur fossil hunter in College Park, Md., have described the fossil of an armored dinosaur hatchling. It is the youngest nodosaur ever discovered, and a founder of a new genus and species that lived approximately 110 million years ago during the Early Cretaceous Era. Nodosaurs have been found in diverse locations worldwide, but they've rarely been found in the United States.  The findings are published in the September 9 issue of the Journal of Paleontology.

"Now we can learn about the development of limbs and the development of skulls early on in a dinosaur's life," says David Weishampel, Ph.D., a professor of anatomy at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "The very small size also reveals that there was a nearby nesting area or rookery, since it couldn't have wandered far from where it hatched. We have the opportunity to find out about dinosaur parenting and reproductive biology, as well as more about the lives of Maryland dinosaurs in general."

Tough Turtles: Surviving the Cretaceous Meteorite Impact

Image 1(Photo by SVP)

New fossil localities from North Dakota and Montana have produced the remains of a turtle that survived the 65 million-year-old meteorite impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. The resulting study, published in the latest issue of the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, suggests that Boremys, a turtle that belongs to a group known as the baenids (bay-een-ids) survived the extinction event unharmed. Baenids are a group of extinct river turtles native to North America that flourished from approximately 80 million to 42 million years ago.


The lead author, Tyler Lyson from Yale University, has been collecting turtles from the western United States for years, and immediately realized the importance of these new specimens, "This find further confirms that turtles were not fazed by the meteorite that killed the dinosaurs 65 million years-ago."