Brian Switek
Brian Switek is an ecology & evolution student at Rutgers University.
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Posts by this author
January 25, 2008
I know some of you, like me, were pretty sad when Kate of The Anterior Commissure decided to stop blogging back in December. As it turns out, it was all just a ruse to make her move over to Pure Pedantry all the more exciting (you know, like how Coke was invented just to make everyone run back to "…
January 25, 2008
I may or may not be able to get to all this stuff in detail today, but here's a smattering of some paleo news to start your day with;
Paleontologists have known for a number of years that the Chicxulub crater in the Yucatan peninsula is likely the "smoking gun" for the end-Cretaceous meteor impact…
January 25, 2008
As visually striking as the may be, peacocks (males of Pavo cristatus) have become the equivalent of pigeons at many zoological parks. Surely they seem out of place when compared to the more usual avian fauna of New Jersey the chickadee or Canada goose, but they have become so familiar that they'…
January 24, 2008
While the most popular dinosaurs have names like Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops few people know one of paleontology's great secrets; the most numerous remains of a large vertebrates found in rocks of Mesozoic age carry the title "Chunkosaurus." Scraps of bone that may be difficult to ascribe to a…
January 24, 2008
By now regular readers of this blog know that I have a definite affinity for saber-toothed critters, a rather motley assemblage of unrelated animals which include a large number of extinct and extant animals. Many primate species, somewhat surprisingly, fall into this category. Some…
January 23, 2008
Modern geology is dictated by uniformitarianism as proposed by Charles Lyell in his Principles of Geology, a book that rightly displaced the "armchair speculations" of catastrophists.
In nearly any book about 19th century science, Charles Darwin, paleontology, or geology, the name Charles Lyell…
January 23, 2008
The latest edition of The Accretionary Wedge is up at Green Gabbro, although I wasn't able to get my uniformitarianism vs. catastrophism post finished in time (it's almost done though; it'll be up later today). There's some great stuff over there, so be sure to check out the myth-busting entries…
January 23, 2008
Not long ago I wrote about some of the potential risks for scientists who do much of their work in the field rather than the lab, and according to the Salt Lake Tribune there's a new danger to be on the look-out for; a predator-control device known as a M-44. In 2003 Dennis Slaugh was riding an atv…
January 23, 2008
According to a news item posted on CNN.com yesterday, at least 50 gharials have died due to unknown causes since early December in the area of the Chambal river in India. Pollution and parasites seem to be the main contenders for a culprit, conservation biologists reporting that the livers and…
January 23, 2008
Josephoartigasia monesi may now be known as the largest rodent to have ever lived, but it still has a number of super-sized extant relatives. The fourth largest of living rodents is the mara (Dolichotis sp.), of which there are two species (the one pictured above is the Patagonian mara, Dolichotis…
January 22, 2008
That's the advice my wife gave to me, anyway. It's the first day of classes here at Rutgers, and things got off to a rather hellish start. After driving back and forth to North Carolina over the course of the past weekend without any major problems, my car decided to stall out in the middle of a…
January 22, 2008
There's a new blog carnival in town; Berry Go Round, a botanical carnival organized by the blogger behind Seeds Aside. The first edition is coming up soon, so if you've got something to add to the garden of posts be sure to check it out!
[Also, remember that the next edition of The Boneyard is…
January 22, 2008
In addition to the blue-eyed black lemur I mentioned yesterday, the golden-crowned sifaka (Propithecus tattersalli) was another lemur I got the chance to see at the Duke Lemur Center. Like many other lemurs, this species is under threat from the development of agriculture and habitat fragmentation…
January 21, 2008
It's amazing how quickly three days can pass by; on Thursday I made a mad dash to make sure everything was in order for my trip to North Carolina and by 10:30 Friday morning I was sitting in an NC hotel room, not sure if I was awake or asleep. I didn't have much time to sort myself out, though, as…
January 21, 2008
Most of the animals I post pictures of here are rare, endangered, or otherwise impressive, but I shouldn't be too quick to shun local, common wildlife. This photograph is of a laughing gull (Larus atricilla) taken at Cape May, NJ, although you can find them just about anywhere that there's a free…
January 20, 2008
The Komodo dragon (Varanus komodoensis) is the largest living species of lizard in the entire world, and while the large size of this reptile has often been attributed to island gigantism some research has suggested that varanid lizards gained large size relatively early on in their evolutionary…
January 19, 2008
The 2nd Annual Science Blogging Conference is now over, but the festivities sure aren't; I'll soon be hitting the bar with some of my fellow Sciblings and other wonderful people I've met over the past few days. I really wish I had brought a working laptop to blog this event as it has been unfolding…
January 19, 2008
Today's the big day for the Science Blogging Conference, and it looks like we're probably going to get a reprieve from the winter weather that was threatening to mess everything up (although I shouldn't speak too soon). Last night I got to meet a few of my fellow Sciblings, other bloggers, and…
January 19, 2008
These bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) were from a group of about twelve that I saw last summer off Cape May, NJ. Recent molecular studies suggest that they may be another species, however; the Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops aduncus).
January 18, 2008
I just made it to NC and am all set at the hotel, although now I'm off again to see the lemurs over at Duke. Unfortunately I forgot my camera cable, but there'll be plenty of pictures to post when I get back. I was also surprised to find out that I've been linked by Andrew Sullivan over at The…
January 17, 2008
It's barely Friday, but I need to put today's PotD up early since I'm literally about to leave for North Carolina. I shouldn't be seeing any sunrise for a few hours yet, but I'm sure I'll see all the bars letting out as I pass through New Brunswick on the way to the Turnpike.
January 17, 2008
I haven't had the chance to fully read it over yet, but there's a new paper in PLoS about chimpanzees sharing foods raided from local farmers, the behavior potentially showing some parallels with meat-sharing behaviors seen in other populations of chimpanzees. I'll soon write something a little…
January 17, 2008
At about 2 AM tomorrow morning I'll be hopping in the car to head down to North Carolina for the 2nd Annual Science Blogging Conference (and I'll even be speaking with some other wonderful student bloggers), but never fear, dear reader; I'll be bringing my clunky old laptop with me to write about…
January 17, 2008
I don't know very much about plants, but this is too cool not to mention; [A]n absolutely massive new genus of palm tree has been described from Madagascar that puts nearly all its energy into fruiting, dying after an explosion of flowers and fruit. The new genus is described in the Botanical…
January 17, 2008
Yesterday I received my review copy of Grave Secrets of Dinosaurs: Soft Tissues and Hard Science by Phillip Manning (supposedly all about the hadrosaur mummy "Dakota"), and while I usually try to keep quiet about my thoughts on a book until I've finished it I just can't keep my trap shut this time…
January 17, 2008
Darren has announced that there will soon be a conference over in the UK called "Dinosaurs - A Historical Perspective," and it sounds like it'll be one of the most fantastic meetings to take place in paleontology this year. I can't go (have debt, won't travel), but if you can I would highly…
January 17, 2008
I know most of you have seen this one before, but it's still one of my favorites. It was taken during sunrise on July 15th, 2007 at Cape May, NJ, and there were a number of large, expired cnidarians floating around in the surf. I have no idea what species this is, but it did make for a beautiful…
January 16, 2008
I heard about this on NPR last night and I think it's a great idea; Mark Bent has invented a solar-powered flashlight, and when you buy one someone in an impoverished area that lacks electricity for lights at night also will receive one (and you get to pick where your contribution goes). From what…
January 16, 2008
Dinner inside the belly of Iguanodon.My fellow scibling Jonah Lehrer has a new piece in SEED extending the argument from the end of his book Proust Was a Neuroscientist called "The Future of Science... Is Art?" It's pretty interesting, exploring the relation between physics and neuroscience to art…
January 16, 2008
Thanks to conservation efforts, gray wolves in various parts of the United States have made a comeback, enough to potentially be removed from the endangered species list, but not everyone is happy that the wolves are doing so well. Indeed, if plans move forward to remove the protected status of…