The last of the temnospondyls—amphibians that look more like crocodiles—became extinct during the Cretaceous period, about 120 million years ago, after thriving on Earth for more than 200 million years.
Now a team of scientists led by Lachlan Hart, a paleontologist and Ph.D. candidate in the School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences at UNSW Sydney, has assessed various methods of estimating the weight of these unique extinct animals. The team's study is published in Palaeontology.
"Estimating mass in extinct animals presents a challenge, because we can't just weigh them like we could with a living thing," said Mr. Hart. "We only have the fossils to tell us what an animal looked like, so we often need to look at living animals to get an idea about soft tissues, such as fat and skin."
Temnospondyls as case studies
Mr. Hart said temnospondyls were "very strange animals."
"Some grew to enormous sizes, six or seven meters long. They went through a larval (tadpole) stage just like living amphibians. Some had very broad and round heads—such as Australia's Koolasuchus, recently named as the Victorian State Fossil Emblem—and others, like the temnospondyls we used in this study, had heads that were more croc-like."
https://phys.org/news/2022-11-scientists-weight-giant-extinct-amphibians.html
Now a team of scientists led by Lachlan Hart, a paleontologist and Ph.D. candidate in the School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences at UNSW Sydney, has assessed various methods of estimating the weight of these unique extinct animals. The team's study is published in Palaeontology.
"Estimating mass in extinct animals presents a challenge, because we can't just weigh them like we could with a living thing," said Mr. Hart. "We only have the fossils to tell us what an animal looked like, so we often need to look at living animals to get an idea about soft tissues, such as fat and skin."
Temnospondyls as case studies
Mr. Hart said temnospondyls were "very strange animals."
"Some grew to enormous sizes, six or seven meters long. They went through a larval (tadpole) stage just like living amphibians. Some had very broad and round heads—such as Australia's Koolasuchus, recently named as the Victorian State Fossil Emblem—and others, like the temnospondyls we used in this study, had heads that were more croc-like."
https://phys.org/news/2022-11-scientists-weight-giant-extinct-amphibians.html