Overview
Explore the fascinating world of horned dinosaurs in this 30-minute lecture from the Royal Tyrrell Museum Speaker Series. Delve into Jordan Mallon's research on the variation in Anchiceratops skulls from the Horseshoe Canyon Formation. Learn about sexual dimorphism, fossil locations, and analytical techniques such as principal component analysis and cluster analysis. Discover the implications of these findings for understanding dinosaur lifespans, habitat fragmentation, and extinction theories. Gain insights into the importance of variation studies in paleontology and their broader implications for our understanding of prehistoric life.
Syllabus
Introduction
Variation
Sexual dimorphism examples
The third hypothesis
More fossils
Location of fossils
Hypothesis generation
Linear measurements
Principal component analysis
Cluster analysis
Kmeans clustering
Implications
Long Lifespan
Habitat fragmentation
generalist vs specialist habits
Implications for dinosaur extinction
Takehome messages
Thanks
Taught by
Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology