Though hardly a household name like Velociraptor or Tyrannosaurus rex, Megalosaurus holds a key place in the history of paleontology. Thats not because its an exceptional dinosaur but as it was the first dinosaur discovered, even before the term dinosaur was ever coined. For that reason, it is phenomenally important, according to Emma Nicholls, Collections Manager of Vertebrate Palaeontology at Oxford Universitys Museum of Natural History.What we Know About the MegalosaurusMegalosaurus is known to have roamed what is now the United Kingdom in the Mid Jurassic, between 168 million years to 165 million years ago. A meat-eating theropod, it stretched between about 20 and 30 feet in length. Based on early fossil discoveries it was once thought to be as long as 65 feet. But its actually on the lower end of the large theropods that roamed the later Cretaceous period. It was probably a bipedal, agile hunter, says Nicholls.Though the animal itself doesnt tell us anything fundamentally radical in terms of science, it's hugely important from a historical point of view, says Nicholls. It was named at a time when the word dinosaur didn't exist. Back in the 19th century it was one of three animals upon which the now famous group Dinosauria was founded, she adds. Several fossil discoveries tell the tale of the Megalosaurus and how its importance has evolved through time. 1. 1676s: A Mystery FossilThe first discovery of Megalosaurus stretches back to 1676 when workers recovered a fossil from Stonesfield quarry, a crucial site in the story of Megalosaurus. This fossil made its way into the hands of Robert Plot, who worked at Oxford University. Due to the fossils similarities to a certain part of the human anatomy, a scientist, Richard Brookes, named it Scrotum Humanum shortly after its discovery. Based on where it was found, it is believed that the fossil Plot described may have belonged to Megalosaurus as a host of other fossils emerged around the same site much later on. Unfortunately, no one knows where that fossil is now, says Nicholls, so there is no way of verifying that. In his day, however, Plot had his own theories. He first posited that it may have belonged to an elephant brought to England by the Romans but ultimately proposed it was an enormous bone of truly gigantic men or women from Biblical times. As humorous as this may sound today, such beliefs regarding the origins of fossils in Plots day were quite common.2. 1824: The First Dinosaur Richard Owen famously coined the term dinosaur in 1842, describing a long extinct group of terrible lizards. But not long before, William Buckland, a reader in geology at Oxford University at the time, examined a group of 15 fossils recovered from various sites, including the Stonesfield quarry. They included a large femur, a jawbone complete with some teeth, and vertebrae, says Nicholls.Examining these fossils and working with naturalist Mary Morland and the French anatomist and zoologist Georges Cuvier, Buckland eventually described them as belonging to a species he dubbed Megalosaurus, or great lizard, in 1824. A few years later came descriptions of Iguanodon and Hylaeosaurus, based on other fossils found in England. Owen would eventually use all three in his description of the now widely known dinosauria group. 3. The Jawbone DiscoveryAmong the 15 fossils used by Buckland to describe Megalosaurus, the jawbone is perhaps the most important, says Nicholls. Thats primarily due to some technical aspects of paleontological taxonomy. Originally those 15 fossils made up the type specimens from which Megalosaurus was first described.But since then, researchers have tried to clean up the rather messy approach taken back then. That's not how you would do science today, Nicholls says. You have to have one specimen, not a group of specimens, because it just breaks the system.So today, scientists now use the features of the jawbone to distinguish Megalosaurus from other dinosaurs. Thats known as the lectotype because it was selected from amongst the already described fossil material. The other fossils from the original discovery are referred to as the paralectotype. In short, the jawbone holds the key to identifying this particular species.4. A Dinosaur HighwaySince its description, the discovery of other fossils such as an arm, leg, and bits and pieces of cranial material have allowed scientists to round out a picture of what Megalosaurus likely looked liked, coupled with learnings from other similar and more complete dinosaur skeletons. Yet, a startling discovery announced earlier this year reveals a fascinating and momentary glimpse of this dinosaur on the move. Unearthed by sheer chance at a quarry, researchers, including Nicholls, revealed a series of footprints or trackways of herbivores and carnivores, including Megalosaurus.It offers a rare hint into the life of this species, showing that it lived in close proximity to species such as Cetiosaurus and Diplodocus, herbivores far larger than Megalosaurus itself. Its really amazing to be co-leading an excavation of dinosaur trackways at any time, but to do it in the 200th anniversary of Megalosaurus discovery was really exciting, Nicholls says. Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Science Direct. Middle JurassicNatural History Museum. MegalosaurusOxford University Museum of Natural History. Robert PlotNatural History Museum. Dinosauria: How the terrible lizards got their nameMuseum of Natural History. The Oxford Dinosaur that Started it allUniversity of Oxford. Britains dinosaur highwaySean Mowbray is a freelance writer based in Scotland. He covers the environment, archaeology, and general science topics. His work has also appeared in outlets such as Mongabay, New Scientist, Hakai Magazine, Ancient History Magazine, and others.

Nature, Published online: 17 February 2025; doi:10.1038/s41586-025-08763-zAuthor Correction: FANCD2FANCI surveys DNA and recognizes double- to single-stranded junctions

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Sewing cloth together can be a huge chore in 3D, so the well-known Blender artist Jesse Miettinen came up with a great add-on that will save you time and effort by automatically connecting seams of any fabric.Need more details on your clothes and accessories? Miettinen has a fantastic solution that will add seams, zippers, straps, buckles, and wrinkles to your 3D object with a mask.Unfortunately, both Geometry Nodes-powered add-ons are still in development but will hopefully be available for all Blender enthusiasts soon, turning the software into one that can compete with Marvelous Designer.Meanwhile, you can enjoy Miettinens tool that applies procedural damage to 3D hard-surface models.He has also presented a procedural birch tree generatorboasting superfast canopy calculations, wind, and root deformations:Full of smart ideas, the artist has experimented with layering multiple rain effects based on geometry. But most excitingly, he has made all of his Blender add-ons available for free.Find more on his X/Twitter and join our80 Level Talent platformand ournew Discord server, follow us onInstagram,Twitter,LinkedIn,Telegram,TikTok, andThreads,where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.Source link The post Jesse Miettinens Blender Add-Ons Sew Seams Automatically & Add Zippers, Straps, and Wrinkles appeared first on CG SHARES.

Card evolution is a big part of Clash Royale. With this feature, you can use evolution shards to upgrade regular cards into stronger versions. These evolved cards come with special abilities. Some, like Wall Breakers and Wizard, get extra protection, and others, like P.E.K.K.A and Knight, get more health.

A player goes sledding accidentally in Red Dead Redemption and more funny accidental wins.

The SSD is compact and capable, but rather pricey.

Looking for NYT Connections answers and hints? Here's all you need to know to solve today's game, plus my commentary on the puzzles.

How the emotional Raka scene from Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes was made. An excerpt from befores & afters magazine.Raka, Noa and Mae are confronted by Proximus muscle at a river crossing in Wes Balls Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes. The FX simulations in that sequence would require 1.2 petabytes (1.2 billion megabytes) of disk space. To build up that scene, animation started with the original performance capture, some of which was carried out in partial sets with flowing water.Our work was a lot of back and forth with what shots retained plate elements for the water and what would ultimately be CG, relates animation supervisor Paul Story. We would be trying to keep as much of what the plate performance was there.A great example of that is a close-up shot where Raka pushes Mae up out of the water, advises VFX supervisor Erik Winquist. Thats the performance take. Special effects provided us with a small river tank that had this current flowing that they could control. Freya and Peter are there in that river flow. We were able to use Freya, paint out Peter, and replace him with CG, of course, but the water that was actually pushing up against Peters chest in his wetsuit that he was wearing is in the movie. It was great to actually take advantage of the plate water.Although Wt FX had gone through a major R&D phase for Avatar: The Way of Water to develop its Loki state machine for coupled fluid simulations, the river sequence in Kingdom presented some different challenges, in particular, that the water was of a nasty sediment-filled and dirt and debris type, with much surface foam. For the purposes of efficiency and flexibility, we were leaning less on the state machine approach and bringing back in some of the older ways of working on water sims, notes Winquist. One thing wed do is run a primary sim at low-res first that would give Paul and his team a really low-res mesh that they could at least animate to. So for example, theyd translate Peter as Raka, who was sitting in an office chair getting pulled around on a mocap stage, and work that into a very low-res sim. In the meantime, the FX team would direct the flow and get a rough version of that in front of Wes. This essentially involved art directing the current and camera, specifies Winquist. Does the camera dip under for a moment and come back over? What does that mean for having to play water sheeting down the lens? Once we had that art directed river in low-res, animation could go off and start animating apes against that current. Then also our FX team could go in and start looking at up-resing that into a much higher resolution sim.The next steps were a back and forth of animation animated to a low-res mesh. The benefit is that the animation done using the low-res mesh matches well to and integrates with the subsequent high-res fluid simulations, although tweaking is always required. Once these steps occur, the creatures team would take the flow fields of the simulation to affect the hair of the apes.For that were using Loki for the hair of the creatures and water to all interact, says Winquist. Then we take the creature bakes, bring them back into the sim, and then FX has to go in and do a super high-resolution, thin-film simulation against the hairs, because now we need to make sure that were taking into account volume preservation of the water. If they jump out of the water, we also need to show that the water is now starting to drain out of their hair.To help with simulating Rakas complex fur in its wet state, visual effects supervisor Stephen Unterfranz pitched the idea of placing the digital character in the water, running a simulation and seeing what would happen to the fur and then sculpting a bespoke groom just for use when he is in the water. It helped with establishing a characteristic parted hair look on the fur of Rakas arm and body, owing to the pressure of the rushing water.issue #27 Kingdom of the Planet of the ApesInterestingly, Rakas fall into the raging rapids of the river was something Wt FX had to revisit a couple of times, owing to a change in the line the character delivers. It was originally filmed in the Sydney backlot set with the scripted line of The work continues, said to Noa. Wes came to the realization that that was the wrong thing for that character to say as his last words, relates Winquist. The switch to Together. Strong. essentially echoes the Apes. Together. Strong. line from from Caesar, it lands so much harder as the last thing were going to hear from this mentor character.With only around a month before delivery, Macon re-delivered the line by simply recording himself on video on his iPhone. The audio from that is actually whats in the movie, reveals Winquist. It really came down to an animator having to look at what we were seeing from that iPhone footage and put that in there. It was a, My God, this is kind of devastating, this moment.The post The river and 1.2 petabytes of disk space appeared first on befores & afters.

Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the alleged murder of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, is in prison awaiting trial. But he still managed to launch a new website, along with his first official statement since his arrest, via his legal team.The message stated that Mangione, who is being held at Brooklyns Metropolitan Detention Center, has been overwhelmed by and grateful for the support hes received in the form of letters from those who have been moved by his story.Although Mangione is charged with Thompsons murder, some Americans who are frustrated with the state of the health insurance industry have celebrated Mangione as a folk hero. Not long manhunt for the shooter began, there were memes, donations, merchandise, and conversations over the potential of copycats.Powerfully, this support has transcended political, racial, and even class divisions, as mail has flooded MDC from across the country, and around the globe, said Mangione in the statement. While it is impossible for me to reply to most letters, please know that I read every one that I receive. Thank you again to everyone who took the time to write. I look forward to hearing more in the future.Mangiones legal team also shared a note on the site, explaining why they felt the need to create the outlet. Due to the extraordinary volume of inquiries and outpouring of support, this site was created and is maintained by Luigi Mangiones New York legal defense team to provide answers to frequently asked questions, accurate information about his cases, and dispel misinformation, the note read. The intent is to share factual information regarding the unprecedented, multiple prosecutions against him.Per the sites FAQ page, Mangiones team asked that supporters limit the number of certain items they are sending, such as photos. Luigi is allowed to receive photos via Shutterfly and FreePrints in accordance with mail procedures while in custody, the section explains, noting Mangione has received many photos.Due to the volume of photos, they could take longer than usual to be screened and shared. Luigi appreciates the photos that are sent and kindly asks that people send no more than five photos at a time. Please note that every photo that is received is screened and reviewed by law enforcement. It also asked that supporters temporarily refrain from sending books, given a large number have already been sent.The site also includes a link to a Give Send Go crowdfunding website, which supporters have been donating to in order to help pay for the suspects legal fees. As of Monday afternoon, the donations topped $475,000.Last week, the accuseds attorney, Karen Friedman Agnifilo told ABC News, Luigi is aware of the fund and very much appreciates the outpouring of support. Agnifilo continued, My client plans on utilizing it to fight all three of the unprecedented cases against him.Mangione has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which include first-degree murder, an act of terrorism, criminal possession of a weapon and forgery by using a fake ID. His next court appearance is scheduled for February 21 in Manhattan.