Paleontologists study the history of life on Earth as shown in the fossil record. Fossils are the traces of organisms that lived in the past and are preserved in Earth's crust. Paleontology involves the identification and naming of fossil species and organisms and the determination of the environment in which they lived. Paleontology is considered a subcategory of geology. It is a very broad science that uses biology, geology, chemistry, and physics. There are many subdivisions in the field of paleontology, including:
- vertebrate paleontology, the study of fossils of animals with backbones;
- invertebrate paleontology, the study of fossils of animals without backbones;
- micropaleontology, the study of fossils of single-celled organisms;
- paleobotany, the study of plant fossils;
- paleoecology, the study of ancient environments;
- biostratigraphy, the study of the fossils in rock layers from different areas to determine their relative ages.
As can be seen by this list, paleontology is more than just the study of dinosaurs. Modern paleontology attempts to understand life-forms as they are related to extended family trees, some of very ancient origins. Thus, paleontologists are frequently involved in studies of evolutionary biology and can be considered systematists, which means that they study the evolutionary relationships among organisms.
When people think of paleontology they think of lots of bones or just sitting out in the sun working with tools. But there is alot more to this scientific study.
The Triassic Period:
Most animals from the Triassic Period were not so carnivorous and huge, but rather small herbivores that lived in packs.
The Jurassic Period:
The Jurassic Period is debatably the most famous of all three periods. Mainly known through the movie Jurassic Park this period contained some of the worlds most dangerous predators.
The Cretaceous Period:
The Cretaceous Period is most famously known for being the last period of the dinosaurs. The answer to their extinction in unknown yet scientists speculate that they may have died out by meteor impact, volcanic eruption, famine, or even all three. Scientists today are trying to successfully clone a living dinosaur through bird DNA. So far with our technology we can only extract and clone DNA as far back as 6.3 million years, but this could very well change over time.
The Ice Age:
Wooly Mammoth:
One of the most famous Ice age mammals is the Wooly Mammoth. Unlike the Columbian Mammoth, the Wooly Mammoth's body was covered in a shaggy, brown, hairy coat that could store fat and of corse resist the cold. They were marked to be extinct around 10,000 years ago but some survived on a distant island for around 4,000 more years leading experts to believe that they could still be out in the harsh climates of Siberia.
Saber Tooth Tiger:
Millions of years ago the first cats of the Ice age had increased size, strength, bone structure, and more. This was to ensure that they would get the kill they needed. During the Ice age some areas were extremely scares when it came to food. Predators such as the Saber Tooth Tiger needed these special traits. Saber Tooths were some of the last of the mammals during the age to survive before extinction.