1. The fossilized skull of Coccocephalus wildi, an early ray-finned fish that swam in an estuary 319 million years ago. The fish is facing to the right, with the jaws visible in the lower right portion of the fossil. The eye socket is the circular, bumpy feature above the jaws. This fish would have been 6 to 8 inches long, about the size of a bluegill. Photo credit: Jeremy Marble, University of Michigan News.

    319-million-year-old fish preserves the earliest fossilized brain of a backboned animal

    The CT-scanned skull of a 319-million-year-old fossilized fish, pulled from a coal mine in England more than a century ago, has revealed the oldest example of a well-preserved vertebrate brain.

  2. Panoramic view of the Serranía del Perijá in Colombia, where a vertebra was found in 1943. The vertebra has allowed for scientists to identify a new species of sauropod, the Perijasaurus lapaz.

    New long-necked dinosaur helps rewrite evolutionary history of sauropods in South America

    A single trunk vertebra has allowed scientists to identify a new species of long-necked, plant-eating dinosaur. The creature inhabited the tropical lowland forested area of the Serranía del Perijá in northern Colombia approximately 175 million years ago.

  3. Larger than life

    What do you do when you’re digging a ditch on your farm and encounter a large, unidentified object sprouting two giant tusks? Call U-M paleontologist Dan Fisher.

  4. Researchers excavate mammoth in Chelsea, MI, Oct. 2015

    Mammoth excavation

    Ancient mammoth unearthed in a farmer’s field southwest of Ann Arbor may provide clues about lives of early humans in the region.

  5. Scan of 3-D mammoth bones.

    Mammoth undertaking

    Prehistoric creatures break digital ground and blow scientific minds in new 3-D showcase.

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