Via Science Fair: … a second study reconstructing Neanderthal noggins suggests that they had brains that developed during infancy much differently than ours. Neanderthals (or Neandertals for many scientists), a stocky human species with a distinctly robust skeleton compared to modern humans, lived throughout Europe and the Near East before disappearing from the archeological record around 30,000 years ago. In the current Oxford Journal of Archeology, a report by Brian Hayden of Canada’s Simon Fraser University, looks at how Neanderthals used caves, transported stone tools and the kinds of items they left behind to try and suss out their lives.…

Via Science Daily: A bizarre creature that lived in the ocean more than 500-million years ago has emerged from the famous Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale in the Canadian Rockies. Officially named Siphusauctum gregarium, fossils reveal a tulip-shaped creature that is about the length of a dinner knife (approximately 20 centimetres) and has a unique filter feeding system.

This new item might be really helpful for those field trips in which we have to wear hard hats! Via Cool Tools – Hat Grabber. Enjoyed the video:

Here are the winners of the National Fossil Day art contest for 2011. 

Have you heard about Pinterest? It is an online pinboard. I just learned about its existence. Rather than explain it here is an example of how it would work for a person interested in minerals and lapidary. 

From a blog Green Tea and Velociraptors and interesting comments too… ….Diplodocus  has always held a significant position in the hearts of dinosaur palaeontologists, as it was one of the very first genera to ever be formally recognised and described. Following, are some images and attempted reconstructions from Hutchinson (1917), and by comparison some excellent recent research by Taylor et al. (2009) on posture in Diplodocus carnegiei (or carnegii). I just figured it would be cool to show how mechanical interpretations and life reconstructions had changed over the years, since from dinosaurs were first mounted to now where more complex biomechanical…

Via College Humor: A mildly funny clay animation of a office of dinosaurs.

Via Eastern Iowa Government: “We found some neat stuff, both historic and prehistoric,” is how Benn, 63, research coordinator and principal investigator for Bear Creek Archeology of Cresco, Iowa, puts it. Benn and his Bear Creek team are working under a $295,000 contract with the Army Corps of Engineers to survey, dig and test and then recover and preserve artifacts from an area that the Corps will disturb as it builds a new system of levees and flood walls to protect the city from a repeat of the city’s 2008 flood. The archeological work is taking place on just the…

MSNBC provides a nice summary of a big year in its article, “Top Ancient Mysteries of 2011“.

Geology.com reminds us about the fun of rock tumblers: Rock tumblers have been manufactured and sold to hobbyists since the 1950′s. The first machines tumbled rocks in metal cans. Since then rubber barrels have significantly reduce the noise, however rotary machines still require at least one month to convert rough rock into brightly polished stones. However, newer vibratory tumblers can process rock in a little over a week.

Via the Times of India: … search giant Google posted the year’s first Doodle, marking the 374th birth anniversary of the world famous Danish geologist Nicolas Steno, also known as the father of Geology. Steno is also known for his valuable contribution in the field of anatomy. Today’s Doodle, which spells out the name of the search engine, appears in the form of earth strata with fossils in various bottom layers and a green crust. On clicking the Doodle, users land on the search results page for Nicolas Steno. Born in Copenhagen to a goldsmith family, Steno left the place…

George Langford III writes about the Lesquereux book on Mazon Creek fossils and provides a digitized and cleaned up version of the original book.