Extinction

A pair of Ammonite fossils, about 4 inches across, within a limestone bed very close to the Permian-Triassic boundary.

How Long Does Mass Extinction Take?

By figuring out the timing and rate of the world's most massive extinction 252 million years ago, scientists hope to figure out how such lethal events work

Hey you guys, got any flowers? I'm starving.

Did Flowers Take Out The Woolly Mammoth?

Some researchers think that the mighty beasts may have been bested by tiny flowers. Or, more precisely, the lack of them

A dingo walks along a road in southern Australia.

Maybe Dingoes Don’t Deserve Their Bad Rap

Studies show that Australia's "favorite scapegoat" most likely didn't kill the Tasmanian tiger

We've Done So Well by Chesapeake Oysters, We Can Start Eating Them Again

Perhaps this time we can keep ourselves from eating them to oblivion

The London Zoo’s Brian Zimmerman looks for a cichlid in Madagascar.

Doomed Species May Be Saved—A Global Search Locates a Female

With this little fish facing down extinction, a global hunt turned up a few remaining wild individuals

Silhouette of the Tyrannosaurus called Stan. This "tyrant lizard king," was excavated and prepared by the Black Hills Institute.

The Top Ten Weirdest Dinosaur Extinction Ideas

Paleontologists, both professional and amateur, have dreamed up some bizarre explanations of how the dinosaurs disappeared from Earth

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What Is the Anthropocene and Are We in It?

Efforts to label the human epoch have ignited a scientific debate between geologists and environmentalists

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Beyond the Childhood Dinosaur Phase: Why Dinosaurs Should Matter to Everyone

Dinosaurs can help us unlock essential secrets about the history of life on Earth

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The Saddest Dinosaur Cartoon Ever

Mountain of Dinosaurs, from 1967, uses extinction as a metaphor for Soviet oppression

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The Fall of Domino Dinosaurs

A delicately-balanced domino setup replays the end of the Age of Dinosaurs

Disease has often been blamed for the extinction of the last dinosaurs, such as this Edmontosaurus at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles.

Disease and the Demise of the Dinosaurs

Cataracts, slipped discs, epidemics, glandular problems and even a loss of sex drive have all been proposed as the reason non-avian dinosaurs perished

Scientists are racing against time: 100,000 species of flora-imperiled by habitat destruction, overharvesting and climate change—are threatened with extinction.

The Noah's Ark of Plants and Flowers

Scientists at a British laboratory are racing to preserve thousands of the world’s threatened plants, one seed at a time

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Ten Extremely Rare Seeds on the Brink of Extinction

The Millennium Seed Bank has set out to collect 25 percent of the world's plant species by 2020—before it is too late

Small coelurosaurs like this Troodon appear to have maintained stable levels of disparity during the last 12 million years of the Cretaceous.

New Wrinkle to the Story of the Last Dinosaurs

Were the last dinosaurs thriving or declining just before Tyrannosaurus and kin disappeared?

The shape of the "Pachysuchus" fossil (in grey) set into a sauropodomorph dinosaur skull

Pachysuchus Actually a Hidden Dinosaur

A strange jaw fragment, once thought to belong to a crocodile-like predator, turned out to be a dinosaur

Did egg-laying spell doom for non-avian dinosaurs, such as this crispy Troodon at the San Diego Natural History Museum?

How Eggs Shaped Dinosaur Evolution

Eggs may have been the secret to dinosaur success, but did they also lead to the dinosaurs' doom?

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Dinosaurs From Space!

Might there be advanced, hyper-intelligent dinosaurs on other planets?

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Dinosaur Deep Freeze

An animated short suggests dinosaurs died out for want of winter coats

A restoration of the Cretaceous snake Sanajeh about to gulp down a baby sauropod.

Scrambled Eggs and the Demise of the Dinosaurs

Did egg-eating lizards and snakes contribute to the dinosaurs' extinction?

Triceratops was one of the last dinosaurs. What would the descendents of this ceratopsid look like if they were alive today?

The Dinosaurs That Never Were

If the non-avian dinosaurs hadn't died out 65 million years ago, what would they look like today?

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