Dr. Elizabeth Jones
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drdinodna.bsky.social
Dr. Elizabeth Jones
@drdinodna.bsky.social
680 followers 71 following 8 posts
Historian of Science + Author of Ancient DNA: The Making of a Celebrity Science + Cretaceous Creatures Project Manager at NC Museum of Natural Sciences & NC State University
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Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
nilese.bsky.social
My Obituary of Elisabeth Vrba—out today in Nature in read-only format:

rdcu.be/ediyO
Elisabeth Vrba obituary: palaeontologist who solved a problem that vexed Darwin | Nature
The biologist’s theories about how environments prompt rapid species evolution and extinction propelled her onto the world stage. The biologist’s theories about how environments prompt rapid species evolution and extinction propelled her onto the world stage.
rdcu.be
March 12, 2025 at 8:15 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
naomioreskes.bsky.social
Looking for specific examples of federal scientists who serve the public?
www.sciencenews.org/article/fire...
Fired federal workers share the crucial jobs no longer being done
Thousands of probationary federal employees received termination notices. Many were doing crucial work at science-related agencies.
www.sciencenews.org
February 22, 2025 at 11:21 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
dollyjorgensen.bsky.social
My amazing book cover is here!
Coming soon from University of Chicago Press.
Cover of Ghosts Behind Glass: Encountering Extinction in Museums by Dolly Jørgensen. Taxidermied Carolina parakeet under a glass bell jar.
February 18, 2025 at 9:20 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
susiedent.com
Word of the day is ‘cumber-world’ (14th century): a person or thing that encumbers the planet.
February 17, 2025 at 1:34 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
jackdashby.bsky.social
New paper re-up! It covers:
- how natural history & world cultures #museums can learn from each other.
- examples of questions natural history museums can ask when researching legacies of colonialism in their collections.
- a discussion about repatriation.
- environmental legacies of #colonialism 👇
jackdashby.bsky.social Jack Ashby @jackdashby.bsky.social · Feb 14
New paper out today!
"The Entwined Human and Environmental Costs of the Colonial Project: Perspectives from Natural History Collections".
I explored a few themes on how natural history #museums are now working to understand their colonial legacies. A little🧵:
www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journal...
A screenshot of the title page and abstract of the paper. It reads: The Entwined Human and Environmental Costs of the Colonial Project Perspectives from Natural History Collections Jack Ashby ■ ABSTRACT: Although such research has long been mainstream in world cultures collections, natural history museums have only recently begun tracing their colonial histories, seeking to identify individuals obscured by power imbalances, and inviting consideration of specimens as artifacts of invasion, exploitation, and extraction, as well as scientific data. This article summarizes these developments within natural history, providing possible approaches and questions. It illustrates how the costs of the colonial project experienced by people and environments were intertwined and follow similar historical processes. Equally, the vital roles natural history collections are playing in researching global environmental crises can also be played by world cultures collections. By learning from each other’s disciplinary research practices, natural history and world cultures collections have huge potential to increase their social relevance.
February 17, 2025 at 10:15 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
lsmonster.bsky.social
I would like to petition for love hearts to replace the standard scale bars for illustrating size in palaeontology papers please.
Also, this shark was smol!
drdinodna.bsky.social Dr. Elizabeth Jones @drdinodna.bsky.social · Feb 14
Love at 1st sight w/ our 1st Galagadon tooth found by Cretaceous Creatures 8th graders! This small extinct shark is from Hell Creek Formation, Montana, ~65 million years ago.
#happyvalentinesday #fossilfriday
February 15, 2025 at 11:03 AM
drdinodna.bsky.social
Love at 1st sight w/ our 1st Galagadon tooth found by Cretaceous Creatures 8th graders! This small extinct shark is from Hell Creek Formation, Montana, ~65 million years ago.
#happyvalentinesday #fossilfriday
February 14, 2025 at 8:49 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
toriherridge.bsky.social
Ochre is red,
The lias is blue,
You can’t know the future,
Without the past too

Happy Valentines day to all of you who value the study of the times before ❤️🦣🏺🪨
February 14, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
markwitton.bsky.social
For #valentinesday and #FossilFriday, here's Tyrannosaurus engaging in face biting, a behaviour evidenced from numerous tooth gouges and puncture wounds in their skulls. Among living species, face biting is strongly correlated with the onset of sexual maturity, so this image is love-adjacent, sorta.
Two Tyrannosaurus wrestle by biting one another ON THEIR MOTHERHUBBIN' FACES. They lean towards the right of the image, the further animal trying to wrench its jaws out of the bite of the closer. One foot of each animal is off the ground, and the tail of the closer individual arcs upwards. Dust and debris scatter as they stagger around the clearing. Behind them is a nice, pleasant day with blue skies and shady trees; the sort of place you might picnic if it weren't for the threat of two 8-tonne reptiles trampling you while they settled their differences. The experience is similar to being in some city parks.
February 14, 2025 at 11:31 AM
drdinodna.bsky.social
Happy Birthday to Charles Darwin, born this day 1809! This is one of his rare first editions of On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859), housed in the library at Florida State University. #darwinday #evolutionarytheory
February 13, 2025 at 12:48 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
science.org
"These [NIH indirect cost reimbursement] cuts should be a rallying cry for higher education to come together to make the case for the American system of research and teaching,” writes @holdenthorp.bsky.social in a new #ScienceEditorial. scim.ag/4b2nv4D
"All disciplines will be affected by these cuts, not just science." - H. Holden Thorp, Editor-in-chief, Science journals
February 11, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
susiedent.com
On dreich days like these it might cheer you up to know that in 19th-century slang an umbrella was a ‘bumbershoot’.
February 10, 2025 at 8:45 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
markwitton.bsky.social
Iguanodon was named 200 years ago today, so here's (AFAIK) the first time it appeared in #paleoart: an 1833 watercolour/pencil study "Reptiles Restored, the Remains of Which Are To Be Found in a Fossil State in Tilgate Forest, Sussex" by George Scharf. That's Iguanodon on the left. #Sciart thread...
Watercolour and pencil sketch showing a Cretaceous landscape as understood in 1833. A lizard-like Iguanodon is shown at left alongside a large palm tree, its tail whirling over rolling hills in the distance. A meandering river bisects the scene, with other animals along its banks. These are, from the top down, a swimming plesiosaur in the stream, a monitor lizard-like Megalosaurus, stork-like birds, the spiky Hylaeosaurus, another swimming plesiosaur, a somewhat dog-like crocodile, and two turtles. The right side of the image shows fern-like plants, reeds and more palm trees.
February 10, 2025 at 9:49 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
fossilhistory.bsky.social
As we near Charles Darwin's birthday, please remember that time he wrote to a friend about this photograph, "If I really have as bad an expression as this photograph gives me, how I can have one single friend is surprising."
A man seated beside a table in a suit, one arm rested on his lap and another on the table. He is slightly frowning and staring rather menacingly at the camera from beneath his brows.
February 11, 2025 at 12:02 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
nilese.bsky.social
I am deeply saddened to have learned of the death, on Feb 5, 2025, of Elisabeth Vrba—a fantastically creative scientist and a warm, wonderful human being. She leaves us a legacy of original macroevolutionary thinking that is still fresh and illuminating.
February 10, 2025 at 6:46 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
chrismanias.bsky.social
Happy 200th Birthday Iguanodon!

Very much a fan of your early-20th century look depicted by Gerhard Heilmann, with prehensile tongue and power-walk
A coloured painting, depicting two Iguanodon in a forested environment. The Iguanodon are bipdel and very scaly, with iguana-like crested heads. One is walking in the foreground in a determined manner, with thumb-spikes outstretched, and in the background one is stretching up to eat leaves from a tree, with a prehensile tongue gripping the branches.
February 10, 2025 at 9:07 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
A sedimentary ancient DNA perspective on human and carnivore persistence through the Late Pleistocene in El Mirón Cave, Spain www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A sedimentary ancient DNA perspective on human and carnivore persistence through the Late Pleistocene in El Mirón Cave, Spain - Nature Communications
Archaeological contexts in caves provide an opportunity to examine human and animal dynamics through climatic events. Here, the authors present sedaDNA of 28 taxa from El Mirón Cave, Spain, including ...
www.nature.com
February 9, 2025 at 8:45 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
In a 1st, ancient proteins reveal sex of human relative from 3.5 million years ago www.livescience.com/archaeology/...
In a 1st, ancient proteins reveal sex of human relative from 3.5 million years ago
Researchers have extracted ancient proteins from australopithecine fossils and determined whether they were male or female — a first for human evolution studies.
www.livescience.com
February 8, 2025 at 8:01 AM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
thepalass.bsky.social
Congratulations on the new paper published in Nature about the #Cretaceous Antarctic bird skull by Christopher R. Torres and co-authors ✨
Here is the link ⬇️
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

#article #research #paper #news #nature #bird #antarctic
Cretaceous Antarctic bird skull elucidates early avian ecological diversity - Nature
A new, nearly complete fossil skull of Vegavis from the James Ross Basin, Antarctic Peninsula, provides insight into its feeding ecology and exhibits morphologies that support placement amon...
www.nature.com
February 6, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
naomioreskes.bsky.social
Hey scientists. Now would be a good time to revisit @csldf.org guidance on on-line communication.
www.csldf.org/resource/poc...
A Pocket Guide for Scientists: Safeguarding Online Communications - Climate Science Legal Defense Fund
This guide helps researchers understand how to best express their personal views and engage in activism online.
www.csldf.org
February 5, 2025 at 9:01 PM
drdinodna.bsky.social
Resisting by continuing the broadening of participation in science.

Cretaceous Creatures is available nationally.

8th grade science teachers apply today.

cretaceouscreatures.org/get-involved...
February 5, 2025 at 8:49 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
lsmonster.bsky.social
BTW, if you like dinosaurs (which that book is about), the @nhm-london.bsky.social has a *sweet* "dinosaurs 101" course that is presented by the kick-ass @tweetisaurus.bsky.social. naturallycurious.nhm.ac.uk/course/dinos...
Dinosaurs 101
Take a tour through the Mesozoic Era for a deep dive into the world of the dinosaurs: how they evolved, lived, moved, and died.
naturallycurious.nhm.ac.uk
February 5, 2025 at 2:11 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
lsmonster.bsky.social
It's still February, which mean that if you buy any of my kids books on @bookshop-org-uk.bsky.social they'll donate 10% of to the fantastic @booktrust.org.uk & that's ace (here's a link to my books if you like #dogs, #cats, #dinosaurs, tiny #animals & #evolution...) uk.bookshop.org/shop/nickcru...
February 3, 2025 at 2:48 PM
Reposted by Dr. Elizabeth Jones
lsmonster.bsky.social
Hi! Buying books online? Buy them from @bookshop-org-uk.bsky.social! The sales financially support local, independent bookshops AND for the WHOLE of February if you buy ANY CHILDREN'S BOOK from them they will donate 10% to the awesome @BookTrust and @scottishbktrust! uk.bookshop.org #readitforwards
February 1, 2025 at 10:21 AM
drdinodna.bsky.social
big news for #FossilFriday

All 8th-grade science teachers across United States are invited to Cretaceous Creatures, a paleo pub sci project partnering w/ students to do real science w/ real (tiny) fossils from Montana. Join for free access to fossils + more!

cretaceouscreatures.org/get-involved...
January 31, 2025 at 8:58 PM