PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Researchers link an African lizard fossil in Africa with the Komodo dragon in Indonesia

2010-11-19
(Press-News.org) University of Alberta researchers have unearthed a mysterious link between bones of an ancient lizard found in Africa and the biggest, baddest modern-day lizard of them all, the Komodo dragon, half a world away in Indonesia.

Biologists Alison Murray and Rob Holmes say the unique shape of the vertebrae links the 33-million-year-old African lizard fossil with its cousin the Komodo, which has only been around for some 700,000 years.

"The African fossil was found on the surface of a windswept desert," said Holmes. "It's definitely from the lizard genus Varanus and there are more than 50 species alive today, including Komodos and other large lizards."

Holmes says the telltale African vertebrae fossils belonged to a lizard that was about a metre- and-a-half long whose ability to swim may be key to figuring out how more than 30 million years later its ancestors turned up on the other side of the world.

Holmes says the ancient African Varanus specimen was found on land that was once the bottom of a river or small lake. "Whether the animals lived in the water or surrounding land, we don't know, but we do know that some modern day species of Varanus are comfortable swimming in fresh water."

The researchers agree that fresh-water swimming wouldn't get the African lizard all the way to Indonesia. Murray says the mystery of how the animals spread deepens when you consider ancient world geography. "From about 100 million years ago until 12 million years ago, Africa was completely isolated, surrounded by ocean, but somehow they got out of Africa during that period," said Murray. "That's why this paper is important because there was no known land connection."

Murray says one unproven theory of how Varanus moved out of Africa is that over millions of years, small land masses or micro-plates may have moved from one place to another, carrying their fauna with them.

The work of the U of A researchers and various co-authors runs counter to some prevailing theories about the origins of some ancient fossil types found in Africa including Varanus lizards and some fresh-water fish. "The assumption for several types of ancient African fossils is that the animals didn't originate in Africa but came there from Asia," says Holmes. "But the fossil record of Varanus shows exactly the opposite path of migration."

INFORMATION:

The work of Murray and Holmes and various co-authors was published in the journal Palaeontology.



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Timing and costs of dialysis procedures need reconsideration

2010-11-19
1. Early Dialysis Recommendations May Cause More Harm than Good Starting Dialysis when Kidney Function is High Increases Risk of Premature Death Recent guidelines that recommend that kidney disease patients start dialysis before their kidney function has significantly declined may potentially cause harm to patients. When William Clark, MD (Scientist at Lawson Health Research Institute and Professor at The University of Western Ontario, in London, Canada) and his colleagues studied 25,901 patients who started dialysis in Canada between 2001 and 2007, they found that ...

Weekend hospital stays worse for kidney patients

2010-11-19
Patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) who are admitted to the hospital during the weekend are at increased risk of death, according to a study presented at the American Society of Nephrology's 43rd Annual Meeting and Scientific Exposition. "Our study highlights poor outcomes for patients with ESRD admitted over the weekend," comments Ankit Sakhuja, MD, a third year resident in internal medicine at The Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. "Further research is needed to identify the reasons for this 'weekend effect' and to institute appropriate interventions." Using ...

Pomegranate juice: Beyond antioxidants, potential benefits for dialysis patients

2010-11-19
Studies in recent years have claimed multiple health benefits of pomegranate juice, including that it is a good source of antioxidants and lowers both cholesterol and blood pressure, especially in diabetic and hypertensive patients. A preliminary study now suggests that it can ward off a number of complications in kidney disease patients on dialysis, including the high morbidity rate due to infections and cardiovascular events, according to a paper being presented at the American Society of Nephrology's 43rd Annual Meeting and Scientific Exposition in Denver, CO. Batya ...

For macaques, male bonding is a political move

2010-11-19
"We were able to show that the benefit of social bonding accrues through 'the manipulation of ones' own and others' social relationships,' which is one definition of politics," said Oliver Schülke of Georg August University Göttingen in Germany. "The bond does not directly affect access to desirable resources but helps males to climb up the social ladder and to stay up there at the cost of other males that lose their status." Earlier evidence had shown that female animals live longer and have more offspring when they form strong bonds with other females. The benefit of ...

Rare mutations linked with catastrophic aortic aneurysms

2010-11-19
TAAD causes thousands of deaths in the United States each year. Although timely surgical repair of aneurysms can prevent death, thoracic aneurysms are often asymptomatic until dissection (tearing of the vessel wall), and there are few recognized risk factors that can be used for screening. "Prospective identification of patients at risk for TAAD using a genetic strategy will be critical to prevent sudden deaths from this treatable disease," explains senior study author Dr. John W. Belmont from Baylor College of Medicine. To begin to unravel the genetic origins of TAAD, ...

FDA review on transgenic salmon too narrow

2010-11-19
DURHAM, N.C. -- The review process being used by the Food and Drug Administration to assess the safety of a faster-growing transgenic salmon fails to weigh the full effects of the fish's widespread production, according to analysis by a Duke University-led team in this week's Science. The salmon, whose genome contains inserted genes from two other fish species, could become the first genetically modified animal approved for human consumption in the United States. The FDA held two days of hearings in September to assess the fish's human and environmental health risks. ...

It takes a village: Mechanism alerts neighbors to amplify immune response

2010-11-19
The pathogen Shigella flexneri invades the cells that line the gut and causes Shigellosis, a disorder characterized by diarrhea and sometimes even death in humans. S. flexneri subverts the normal immune response of the host by interfering with the ability of the infected cell to secrete chemicals called chemokines that stimulate inflammation. Inflammation is a complex response to pathogens that attracts white blood cells to destroy the bacteria. Despite the documented ability of S. flexneri to suppress inflammation in infected cells, intestinal cells do secrete large amounts ...

Researchers uncover surprise link between weird quantum phenomena

Researchers uncover surprise link between weird quantum phenomena
2010-11-19
Researchers have uncovered a fundamental link between the two defining properties of quantum physics. Stephanie Wehner of Singapore's Centre for Quantum Technologies and the National University of Singapore and Jonathan Oppenheim of the United Kingdom's University of Cambridge published their work today in the latest edition of the journal Science. The result is being heralded as a dramatic breakthrough in our basic understanding of quantum mechanics and provides new clues to researchers seeking to understand the foundations of quantum theory. The result addresses the ...

Panama Canal, Panama City at risk of large earthquake, says new research

2010-11-19
Panama Canal, PanNew data suggest that the Limon and Pedro Miguel faults in Central Panama have ruptured both independently and in unison over the past 1400 years, indicating a significant seismic risk for Panama City and the Panama Canal, according to research published today by the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (BSSA). The Panama Canal is undergoing expansion to allow for greater traffic of larger ships, scheduled for completion by 2014. As part of a seismic hazard characterization for the Panama Canal Authority (ACP) expansion project, Rockwell, ...

Planet from another galaxy discovered

Planet from another galaxy discovered
2010-11-19
Over the last 15 years, astronomers have detected nearly 500 planets orbiting stars in our cosmic neighbourhood, but none outside our Milky Way has been confirmed [1]. Now, however, a planet with a minimum mass 1.25 times that of Jupiter [2] has been discovered orbiting a star of extragalactic origin, even though the star now finds itself within our own galaxy. It is part of the so-called Helmi stream — a group of stars that originally belonged to a dwarf galaxy that was devoured by our galaxy, the Milky Way, in an act of galactic cannibalism about six to nine billion years ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Liver fibrosis to cancer: scientists map path to block deadly transition

Microbiota boost immunotherapy? A meta-analysis dives into fecal microbiota transplantation and immune checkpoint inhibitors

Cancer's double agents: Fibroblasts both help and hinder immunotherapy

Unveiling large multimodal models in pulmonary CT: A comparative assessment of generative AI performance in lung cancer diagnostics

AI can fake peer reviews and escape detection, study finds

T cell senescence in the tumor microenvironment

Simple solution to save lives globally: Low-cost ‘SimpleSilo’ offers hope for babies with gastroschisis

Curbing roadway fatalities hinges on shared responsibility and rethinking safety

Beta-HPV can directly cause skin cancer in immunocompromised people

Efforts underway to end race-based assessments of lung function

CAR-T cell therapy linked to increased risk of secondary primary malignancies globally

THER: integrative web tool for tumor hypoxia exploration and research

How sources of dietary fat influence cancer growth in obesity

Women less likely than men to receive MS drugs

AI language models sharpen chest CT diagnoses, speeding surgical decisions

Machine learning model predicts which patients with nasopharyngeal cancer respond to radiation

GenAI models extract pathological features for lung adenocarcinoma grading and prognosis

New research further investigates safety of general anesthesia in infants

We might inhale 68,000 lung-penetrating microplastics daily in our homes and cars – 100x previous estimates

Indian adults who move to cities are significantly more likely to become obese than their rural counterparts - and the longer they stay, the greater the risk

Instagram images could influence public opinion on certain major events

Different dimensions of psychopathy might be associated with different physiological underpinnings of facial emotion recognition - and oxytocin could affect this skill - per scoping review of 66 studi

How cumulative heat exposure affects students

An international survey of over 300 adults reveals that males born in summer are potentially more prone to depression than those born in other seasons

The unusual head of a fish and the puzzle of its genes

How does metformin lower blood sugar?

Increasing solar power could lead to significant cuts in CO2 emissions

Black Death offers window into how childhood malnutrition affects adult health

Clinical trial finds safe, effective treatment for children with severe post-Covid syndrome

Researchers map where solar energy delivers the biggest climate payoff

[Press-News.org] Researchers link an African lizard fossil in Africa with the Komodo dragon in Indonesia