Free Online Paleontology (And Other) Books Courtesy Johns Hopkins University Press 26MAR2020

 Free Online Paleontology (And Other) Books Courtesy Johns Hopkins University Press

Although this is off-topic, thought people on list still might

appreciate it given the circumstances.

Johns Hopkins University Press has made available online books

for free for this period of cancelled or remote classes. Some

paleontology books, of which each chapter can be downloaded

free as a PDF are:

 

Birds of Stone: Chinese Avian Fossils from the Age of Dinosaurs

Luis M. Chiappe and Meng Qingjin, 2016

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/48019

 

The Rise of Birds: 225 Million Years of Evolution

Sankar Chatterjee, 2015

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/39108

 

Transylvanian Dinosaurs

David B. Weishampel and Coralia-Maria Jianu, 2011

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/1874

 

The Rise of Marine Mammals: 50 Million Years of Evolution

Annalisa Berta, 2017

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/56360

 

The Rise of Reptiles: 320 Million Years of Evolution

Hans-Dieter Sues, 2019

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/67468

 

Smilodon: The Iconic Sabertooth

edited by Lars Werdelin, H. Gregory McDonald, and

Christopher A. Shaw, 2018

https://muse.jhu.edu/book/58589

 

Other free books by Johns Hopkins University Press

can be found at:

https://muse.jhu.edu/search?action=browse&limit=publisher_id:1

 

Yours,

 

Paul H.

Interesting and Sub-noteworthy Preprints from the arXiv Preprint Archive 22MAR2020

 Interesting and Sub-noteworthy Preprints from the arXiv Preprint Archive

Some interesting and sub-noteworthy preprints from the arXiv preprint archive.

 

Barnes, J.W., O'Brien, D.P., Fortney, J.J. and Hurford, T.A., 2002.

Superiority of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory (LPL) over

Steward Observatory (SO) at the University of Arizona. arXiv

preprint astro-ph/0204013.

https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2002astro.ph..4013B/abstract

 

Morzinski, Katie M., and Jared R. Males. "On the influence of the

Illuminati in astronomical adaptive optics." arXiv preprint

arXiv:1203.6708 (2012).

https://arxiv.org/abs/1203.6708

 

Schoch, Daniel. "Gods as Topological Invariants." arXiv preprint

arXiv:1203.6902 (2012).

https://arxiv.org/abs/1203.6902

 

Armstrong, E., 2012. Non-detection of the Tooth Fairy at Optical

Wavelengths. arXiv preprint arXiv:1204.0492.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1204.0492

 

Tippett, B.K., 2012. Possible bubbles of spacetime curvature

in the South Pacific. arXiv preprint arXiv:1210.8144.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1210.8144

 

Rachen, J.P. and Gahlings, U.G., 2013. Conspiratorial cosmology-

the case against the Universe. arXiv preprint arXiv:1303.7476.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1303.7476

 

Kane, S.R. and Selsis, F., 2014. A Necro-Biological Explanation

for the Fermi Paradox. arXiv preprint arXiv:1403.8146.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1403.8146

 

Scott, D., Frolop, A., Narimani, A. and Frolov, A., 2015. A

Farewell to Falsifiability. arXiv preprint arXiv:1504.00108.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1504.00108

 

Lund, M.B., 2016. Astrology in the Era of Exoplanets. arXiv

preprint arXiv:1603.09496.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1603.09496

 

Frolop, A. and Scott, D., 2016. Pi in the sky. arXiv preprint

arXiv:1603.09703.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1603.09703

 

Armstrong, E., 2017. A Neural Networks Approach to

Predicting How Things Might Have Turned Out Had I

Mustered the Nerve to Ask Barry Cottonfield to the Junior

Prom Back in 1997. arXiv preprint arXiv:1703.10449.

https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.10449

 

The above list is modified from "Fake Physics: Spoofs,

Hoaxes and Fictitious Science by Andrew May.

 

Yours,

 

Paul H.

Asteroid Could Cause Atmospheric Explosion If It Gets Too Close 17MAR2020

 Asteroid Could Cause Atmospheric Explosion If It Gets Too Close

Asteroid Could Cause Atmospheric Explosion If It Gets Too Close

International Business Times

https://www.ibtimes.com/asteroid-could-cause-atmospheric-explosion-if-it-gets-too-close-2940563

2020EF - JPL Small-Body Database Browser

https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2020%20EF;old=0;orb=0;cov=0;log=0;cad=0#orb

https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2020%20EF;old=0;orb=0;cov=0;log=0;cad=1#cad

Yours,

Paul H.

How the Moon Formed: New Research About the Giant Impact Hypothesis 11MAR2020

 How the Moon Formed: New Research About the Giant Impact Hypothesis

How the moon formed: New research sheds

light on what happened, Physorg, The Conversation

https://phys.org/news/2020-03-moon.html

https://phys.org/news/2020-03-earth-moon-identical-oxygen-twins.html

The paper is:

Cano, E.J., Sharp, Z.D. & Shearer, C.K. Distinct

oxygen isotope compositions of the Earth and

Moon. Nat. Geosci. (2020).

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-020-0550-0

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-020-0550-0#citeas

Yours,

Paul H.

Fossils Reveal How Much Shorter Days Were 70 Million Years Ago 11MAR2020

 Fossils Reveal How Much Shorter Days Were 70 Million Years Ago

Ancient Shell Has Revealed Exactly How Much Shorter

Days Were 70 Million Years Ago

https://www.sciencealert.com/old-shell-reveals-earth-s-days-were-half-an-hour-shorter-70-million-years-ago

de Winter, N.J., Goderis, S., Van Malderen, S.J., Sinnesael, M.,

Vansteenberge, S., Snoeck, C., Belza, J., Vanhaecke, F. and

Claeys, P., Sub‐daily scale chemical variability in a Torreites

sanchezi rudist shell: Implications for rudist paleobiology

and the Cretaceous day‐night cycle. Paleoceanography

and Paleoclimatology, p.e2019PA003723

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019PA003723

Yours,

Paul H.

Protein Reported from Meteorite 04MAR2020

 Protein Reported from Meteorite

Protein discovered inside a meteorite

by Bob Yirka , Phys.org, March 3, 2020

https://phys.org/news/2020-03-protein-meteorite.html

Have we really found an alien protein inside a meteorite?

By Leah Crane, New Scientist, March 3, 2020

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2235981-have-we-really-found-an-alien-protein-inside-a-meteorite/

the paper is:

Hemolithin: a Meteoritic Protein containing Iron and Lithium

Malcolm. W. McGeoch, Sergei Dikler, Julie E. M. McGeoch

arXiv:2002.11688 [astro-ph.EP]

https://arxiv.org/abs/2002.11688

Yours,

Paul H.

Evidence of Late Quaternary Fires from Charcoal and Siliceous Aggregates, Eastern US 26FEB2020

 Evidence of Late Quaternary Fires from Charcoal and Siliceous Aggregates, Eastern US

It was pointed out to me that Ballard has a 2015 PhD Dissertation

Ballard, J.P., 2015. Evidence of Late Quaternary Fires from Charcoal

and Siliceous Aggregates in Lake Sediments in the Eastern USA.

PhD Dissertation, University of Tenneessee, Knoxville

https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/3492/

https://trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4871&context=utk_graddiss

The abstract in part states:

"A new microscopic charcoal record from Anderson Pond, Tennessee

revealed high fire activity from 23,000–15,000 cal yr BP when

conifers dominated, and during the Mid-Holocene Warm Period

(8000–5200 cal yr BP), when hardwoods dominated. Macroscopic

charcoal analysis of sediments from Pigeon Marsh, Georgia

showed high fire activity from 16,500–14,500 cal yr BP, below

a major hiatus. Jackson Pond, Kentucky and Cahaba Pond, Alabama

had low macroscopic charcoal concentrations during the late

glacial; largest charcoal peaks occurred around 5000 cal yr BP

 at Jackson Pond, and from 1370–640 cal yr BP at Cahaba Pond."

A related paper is:

Marlon, J.R., Bartlein, P.J., Walsh, M.K., Harrison, S.P., Brown, K.J.,

Edwards, M.E., Higuera, P.E., Power, M.J., Anderson, R.S., Briles,

C. and Brunelle, A., 2009. Wildfire responses to abrupt climate

change in North America. Proceedings of the National Academy

of Sciences, 106(8), pp.2519-2524.

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/106/8/2519.full.pdf

The abstract reads in part.

"We also test the hypothesis that a comet impact initiated continental

-scale wildfires at 12.9 ka; the data do not support this idea, nor are

continent-wide fires indicated at any time during deglaciation. There

are, however, clear links between large climate changes and fire

activity. Biomass burning gradually increased from the glacial period

to the beginning of the Younger Dryas. Although there are changes

in biomass burning during the Younger Dryas, there is no systematic

trend. There is a further increase in biomass burning after the

Younger Dryas. Intervals of rapid climate change at 13.9, 13.2, and

11.7 ka are marked by large increases in fire activity. The timing of

changes in fire is not coincident with changes in human population

density or the timing of the extinction of the megafauna."

Yours,

Paul H.

NASA missed these 11 dangerous asteroids, but an AI caught them 26FEB2020

 NASA missed these 11 dangerous asteroids, but an AI caught them

NASA missed these 11 dangerous asteroids, but an AI caught them

https://bgr.com/2020/02/18/ai-asteroids-detection-threatening-earth/

The open access paper is:

Hefele, J.D., Bortolussi, F. and Zwart, S.P., 2020. Identifying

Earth-impacting asteroids using an artificial neural network.

Astronomy & Astrophysics, 634, p.A45

.https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2020/02/aa35983-19/aa35983-19.html

https://arxiv.org/abs/2001.04177

Yours,

Paul H.

A lateglacial paleofire record for east-central Michigan (Open Access thesis) - Younger Dryas data 24FEB2020

 A lateglacial paleofire record for east-central Michigan (Open Access thesis) - Younger Dryas data

Below is an open access and interesting and comprehensive study of the

Late Quaternary prehistoric wildfire record for east-central Michigan.

Ballard, J.P., 2009. A lateglacial paleofire record for east-central

Michigan MS thesis, University of Cincinnati, Arts and Sciences.

https://etd.ohiolink.edu/pg_10?0::NO:10:P10_ACCESSION_NUM:ucin1250268463#abstract-files

In part the abstract states:

"The results show contemporaneous fire not only at 12,900 BP but multiple

times between 14,500 and 12,900 BP. This synchronicity of the fires

between 14,500 and 12,900 BP suggests some as-yet-indeterminate large-

scale natural cause, or causes. From 12,900 BP on into the Holocene, the

pattern changes. Fires are continuous with high charcoal peaks at Swift

Lake, continuous at Slack Lake but with slightly lower charcoal peaks

compared to Swift, and having much lower peaks at Lake Sixteen and

Big Fish Lake (charcoal is present but at very low levels)."

Yours,

Paul H.

Meteorite 'gold rush' after meteor falls over Prescott, Arizona 21FEB2020

 Meteorite 'gold rush' after meteor fall 16FEB2020 over Prescott, Arizona

Meteorite 'gold rush' after meteor falls over Prescott

By: Chloe Mar, Northern Arizona News, Feb 17, 2020

https://www.abc15.com/news/region-northern-az/prescott/meteorite-gold-rush-after-meteor-falls-over-prescott

Expert in Prescott describes Sunday meteor event in northern Arizona

Joey Carrera, AZFamilyNews, Feb 16, 2020

https://www.azfamily.com/news/expert-in-prescott-describes-sunday-meteor-event-in-northern-arizona/article_282bfc50-5140-11ea-8249-aff2ac03c70c.html

Yours,

Paul H.

How to deflect an asteroid - MIT 21FEB2020

 How to deflect an asteroid - MIT

How to deflect an asteroid.

MIT engineers devise a decision map to identify the best mission

type to deflect an incoming asteroid. Jennifer Chu | MIT News Office

http://news.mit.edu/2020/how-deflect-asteroid-mission-0219

https://futurism.com/the-byte/mit-plans-deflecting-killer-asteroids

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614330/were-going-to-slam-a-spacecraft-into-an-asteroid-to-try-to-deflect-it/

Yours,

Paul H.

The death of dinosaurs was all about the asteroid 31JAN2020

 The death of dinosaurs was all about the asteroid

Yale University. "In death of dinosaurs, it was all about the asteroid

-- not volcanoes." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 16 January 2020.

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200116141708.htm

Meteorite or Volcano? New Clues to the Dinosaurs’ Demise

Twin calamities marked the end of the Cretaceous period, and

scientists are presenting new evidence of which drove one of

Earth’s great extinctions. New York Times, January 16, 2020

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/16/science/dinosaurs-extinction-meteorite-volcano.html

The paper is:

Hull, P.M., Bornemann, A., Penman, D.E., Henehan, M.J., Norris, R.D.,

Wilson, P.A., Blum, P., Alegret, L., Batenburg, S.J., Bown, P.R. and

Bralower, T.J., 2020. On impact and volcanism across the Cretaceous-

Paleogene boundary. Science, 367(6475), pp.266-272.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/367/6475/266.abstract

Yours,

Paul H.

Yarrabubba impact structure, Australia, dated to 2224 - 2234 Ma (end of Snowball Earth) 30JAN2020

 Yarrabubba impact structure, Australia, dated to 2224 - 2234 Ma (end of Snowball Earth)

Earth's oldest asteroid strike linked to 'big thaw'

Curtin University, January 22, 2020

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200122100546.htm

 

the open access paper is:

 

Timmons M. Erickson, Christopher L. Kirkland, Nicholas

E. Timms, Aaron J. Cavosie, Thomas M. Davison. Precise

radiometric age establishes Yarrabubba, Western

Australia, as Earth’s oldest recognised meteorite

impact structure. Nature Communications, 2020; 11 (1)

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-13985-7

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-13985-7

 

Yours,

 

Paul H.

Fireball spotted over Huron County, Michigan 27JAN2020

 Fireball spotted over Huron County, Michigan

Fireball spotted over Huron County, Michigan

Scott Miller, CTV, January 22, 2020

https://london.ctvnews.ca/fireball-spotted-over-huron-county-1.4779117

Fireball ‘as bright as the moon’ lands in Lake Huron

Michgan Live, January 25, 2020

https://www.mlive.com/weather/2020/01/fireball-as-bright-as-the-moon-lands-in-lake-huron.html

A Meteor That Lit Up Ontario Skies This Week

Came All The Way From Beyond Mars (Video)

Lisa Belmonte, Narcity News, January 25, 2020

https://www.narcity.com/news/ca/on/meteor-over-ontario-was-traced-back-to-the-asteroid-belt-beyond-mars

Yours,

Paul H.

Impacts of Google Earth on Scientific Research 27JAN2020

 Impacts of Google Earth on Scientific Research

Liang, J., Gong, J. and Li, W., 2018. Applications and impacts of Google

Earth: A decadal review (2006–2016). ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry

and Remote Sensing, 146, pp.91-107.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327622426_Applications_and_impacts_of_Google_Earth_A_decadal_review_2006-2016

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jianming_Liang2

 

Yours,

 

Paul

 

"The past is never dead. It's not even past."

William Faulkner, Act 1, Scene III, Requiem for a Nun (1951)

Seven billion year-old stardust found in meteorite 15JAN2020

 Seven billion year-old stardust found in meteorite

Meteorite contains the oldest material on Earth: 7-billion-year-old
stardust. The ancient stardust reveals a 'baby boom' in star formation
Field Museum, January 13, 2020
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200113153306.htm
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ancient-meteorite-stardust-oldest-ever-examined-lab

The paper is;

Philipp R. Heck, Jennika Greer, Levke Kööp, Reto Trappitsch, Frank
Gyngard, Henner Busemann, Colin Maden, Janaína N. Ávila, Andrew
M. Davis, Rainer Wieler. Lifetimes of interstellar dust from cosmic
ray exposure ages of presolar silicon carbide. Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences, Jan. 13, 2020; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1904573117

Yours,

Paul H.

Shocked meteorites provide clues to Earth's lower mantle 12JAN2020

 Shocked meteorites provide clues to Earth's lower mantle

Shocked meteorites provide clues to Earth's lower mantle

by Karin Valentine, Arizona State University, January 10, 2019

https://phys.org/news/2020-01-meteorites-clues-earth-mantle.html

https://scitechdaily.com/extraterrestrial-clues-to-earths-lower-mantle-from-shocked-meteorites/

The paper is:

Luca Bindi, Sang-Heon Shim, Thomas G. Sharp, and Xiande Xie,

2020, Evidence for the charge disproportionation of iron in

extraterrestrial bridgmanite. Science Advances?? 10 Jan 2020:

Vol. 6, no. 2, eaay7893 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aay7893

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/2/eaay7893

Yours,

Paul H.

New location proposed for Australasian strewnfield crater 05JAN2020

New location proposed for Australasian strewnfield crater

Crater found from asteroid that covered 10% of Earth's surface in debris. The crater sits beneath a plain of hardened lava that formed after the asteroid impact, which occurred nearly 800,000 years ago.
By Leslie Nemo, Astronomy, Friday, January 3, 2020
https://astronomy.com/news/2020/01/crater-found-from-asteroid-that-covered-10-of-earths-surface-in-debris

The open access paper is:

Sieh, K., Herrin, J., Jicha, B., Angel, D.S., Moore, J.D., Banerjee, P., Wiwegwin, W., Sihavong, V., Singer, B., Chualaowanich, T. and Charusiri, P., 2019. 

Australasian impact crater buried under the Bolaven volcanic field, Southern Laos. 

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/12/24/1904368116.short

Yours,

Paul H.