http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130530132431.htm
NOS Themes
- Science is based on evidence
- Science is subject to change
- Role of chance
- Role of motivation and curiosity
Thursday, May 30, 2013
How Turtles Got Their Shells
Researchers recently discovered an ancient reptile off the coast of South Africa. This find will help to fill a twenty million year gap in the evolution of turtles. It also provides key insight into how turtles ended up developing shells. The shells themselves are made up of over 50 different bones that fuse together to create the hard outer shell. Up until now, the oldest recorded turtle was live approximately 215 million years ago. this new discovery is at least another 40 million years before that. This "new" turtle has the basics for a shell but it is not fully developed like those living today. The hard shell forces turtles to breath differently than other animals so scientists are planning to use this latest discover to investigate how their unique breathing system developed.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130530132431.htm
NOS Themes
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130530132431.htm
NOS Themes
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I found this very interesting! I didn't know what made a turtle's respiratory system unique, so i researched and found that they have lungs like us, but they can be inflated. This helps them to float or store oxygen for when they are underwater.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.ehow.com/info_8737876_respiratory-system-turtles.html
This is quite interesting that the form stayed the same for so long. Even for evolution that is a while. I wonder if we just don't have data for that time or if it just didn't have any evolutionary breakthroughs during that time. I also wonder what caused the shift in populations of shell and not shell turtles.
ReplyDeleteIt is really cool that the shell is made up of many bones fused together. I think the discovery of the new turtle fossil is really important. Its really neat to hear about new discoveries in science because it helps to answer so many questions. Hopefully, there will continue to be many new discoveries and we will learn a lot about different species and how they came to be how they are. I always wonder about all the species we haven't discovered yet and what new things will come up in the future.
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