Davide Foffa

Check out this #CORDIScovery podcast on how we study extinct animals, ecosystem and evolution in deep time. I greatly enjoyed learning and discussing our EU funded projects: #ECODIV, #DINODAWN, #MAPAS with @johnrhutchinson.bsky.social and Sara Varela!

📈 Do you use data science tools for palaeobiological research? 👩‍💻 Are you interested in learning how to create these tools from scratch, and in improving the clarity of your workflows? If so, consider applying to our new Palaeoverse Mentorship Scheme! Find out more: palaeoverse.org/training/men...

Over a decade ago, Tom Challands and I noticed these strange rock pools on the Isle of Skye coast. Hundreds, each the size of a car tire, lined up in zig-zag sequences Dinosaur tracks! We announced the site, then handed it to Paige dePolo to describe for her Masters Now today:

Interested in how species diversity is split between major animal groups? Here is the infographic for you! 🧪⚒️🦀🦑 #evosky

New paper out today! Led by Daniel Schwarz, we retrodeformed the skull and reconstructed the cranio-mandibular musculature of the giant stem-amphibian Mastodonsaurus giganteus. Our results show that Mastodonsaurus had a powerful bite and a crocodile- like bite-and-hold feeding style.

Important reading: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

New review paper with Martín Ezcurra just published in @journalsystpal.bsky.social as part of a special issue! Modern reptiles comprise archosaurs 🐊🦉, lepidosaurs🦎🐍, and turtles🐢, but their origins is murky. Where do turtles fit in, really? And most marine reptiles? Choristoderes? Drepanosaurs? ->

Our @gardenersworldmag.bsky.social garden is open! Between the 18–21 June 2026, explore #prehistoric #plants, hear from @profaliceroberts.bsky.social, and spot our life-size reconstructions of #extinct #animals! Tickets are available through the BBC website. 📷: Jake Atterby

palaeoverse is a community-driven R package of generic functions to help streamline palaeobiological analyses and improve code readability and reproducibility. This is our last version before a major refactor in Autumn, supported by funding from the @softwaresaved.bsky.social.

📢 Please repost! Want to do a Masters by Research at the University of Bristol? If you're interested in phylogenetics, morphology, macroevolution or vertebrate palaeobiology, please get in touch! More information: tinyurl.com/4h6v3s99 ⏰ Deadlines: • International: 30th June • Home: 31st July

A short-snouted ‘sphenosuchian’ with unusual feeding anatomy demonstrates that ecological specialization occurred early in crocodylomorph evolution url: royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article...

A new taxon of saurischian dinosaur from the Coelophysis Quarry of New Mexico, USA (Triassic: latest Norian or Rhaetian) highlights herrerasaurian diversity in the latest Triassic - Srivastava - 2026 - Papers in Palaeontology - Wiley Online Library onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

As the sole living genera of an ancient order of reptiles, tuataras are key for fossil comparisons of extinct species & modern lepidosaurs (lizards & snakes). Here, their axial skeleton is described in detail, offering new insights to this unique creature...Tuatar-ya interested? 🌍🧪👇

How should I publish my digital fossil? Recommendations for the publication of comprehensive 3D datasets in palaeontological studies onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... @daniajinn.bsky.social @mfnberlin.bsky.social @dfg.de @datadryad.bsky.social #FossilFriday

Lystrosaurus embryo! Benoit J, Fernandez V, Botha J (2026) The first non-mammalian synapsid embryo from the Triassic of South Africa. PLoS One 21(4): e0345016. doi.org/10.1371/jour...

‼️🚨 Job Alert ‼️ 🚨 Two Post Doc Opportunities: PDRA in Macroecology / Paleobiology my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru... PDRA in Extinction & Conservation / Paleobiology my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru... Any questions, please get in touch! Closing date May 1st.

A special #fossilfriday, as we were visited by several of our illustrious Univ of Edinburgh paleontology alums! Paige dePolo, Kim Kean, some scrawny balding guy in a flamboyant purple shirt, Sarah Shelley, @davfoff.bsky.social What great students we've had & long may it continue!

The Stuttgart Natural History Museum is offering a postdoc position (m/f/d) in Temnospondyl Geochemistry E 13 TV-L, 100 %, 2 years Application deadline: March 8th, 2026 ➡ Further information: https://t1p.de/nwrfi

Meet Galahadosuchus jonesi, a new crocodylomorph from the Late Triassic of the UK, described by @es-ucl.bsky.social & @nhm-london.bsky.social PhD student Ewan Bodenham (with @stephanspiekman.bsky.social, @tweetisaurus.bsky.social & Paul Upchurch): anatomypubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

What do we want? Fossil databases! 🐚🦕 When do we want them? Forever! 🗓️ Nice new paper highlighting how academic funding systems and digital architecture need to change, to ensure we can protect and sustain our precious fossil data 📚 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Ever wanted to know what the fossil record of trackways can tell us about past life? Well look no further than this excellent review paper in Palaeontology by the one & only @peterfalkingham.com and the legendary Stephen Gatesy: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

youtu.be/KBRFqFpzryY?...

Out in @nature.com today, we shake up the ornithischian family tree. Remember those weird Late Cretaceous iguanodontians, the rhabdodontids? Well they're weird because they aren't iguanodontians. They're ceratopsians. Well, at least some of them are... www.nature.com/articles/s41...

youtu.be/7YjYd_e67wA?...

Our first follow up from the Science paper: New paper on tooth morphology in the Grippia Bonebed - the oldest and most diverse Mesozoic marine tetrapod ecosystem. Paper open access here: njg.geologi.no/publications...

Yes, you CAN go back in time! This StoryMap allows readers to experience several hundred million years of Earth history in just minutes with a scroll-driven animation. Happy GIS Day too! ow.ly/ZjFV50XsVbc Want to know how the team did it? ow.ly/gC3k50XsVQY ⚒️ 🧪 #gischat #geogsky #geogchat 🌎 🌍 🌏

Then we have the Triassic symposium in the room with the massive screen... @elsa-panciroli.bsky.social, @stephanspiekman.bsky.social, and @davfoff.bsky.social shown here..

Save Geology at the University of Leicester

I’ve released a tool to sketch and edit phylogenetic trees! yawak.jp/PhyloWeaver/ Load a Newick file and intuitively add/remove/resize branches. Useful for quick conceptual trees, extracting subtrees, or turning ideas into Newick.

An Edinburgh family photo at the @societyofvertpaleo.bsky.social meeting. Soon after we lost my PhD advisor Mark Norell, it was special to be surrounded by the students and postdocs I’ve supervised!

New @nhm-london.bsky.social 5-day course on integrative biodiversity discovery! Learn how to collect specimens, obtain genomic data, and interpret biodiversity using cutting edge phylogenomic analysis. It's free, and aimed at early career researchers: www.nhm.ac.uk/our-science/...

We've lost Dugie Ross, truly one of the best people I have ever known. He reported the first Scottish dinosaurs, made the Isle of Skye into Scotland's Dinosaur Island, welcomed so many of us onto his island, into his home and family.

A fascinating article by BBC News about the Dewars Farm Quarry dinosaur trackway excavation by scientists from across the UK and Oxford University Museum of Natural History, including some fabulous computer generated animation. Great stuff! www.bbc.co.uk/news/resourc...

A phenomenal paleontologist and a pleasure to talk to at SVP conferences. Mark will be missed.

#Fossil Files podcast fans!! Today sees the release of Fossil Fails II: The tiny dinosaur with the massive flaw... Get our take on that whole Oculudentavis thing - available now on libsyn and wherever you get your podcasts! @thefossilfiles.bsky.social fossils.libsyn.com/fossil-fails...

If you attend or work at a university in the UK, chances are you know someone who is on Indefinite Leave to Remain. Please consider what the recent attacks on ILR from both Reform and Labour are doing to those people you probably know.

If this plan is implemented, it will cripple British universities and health care, and tear apart families. All 'skilled' immigrants will require £60k salary & cannot use NHS. Permanent residence will be scrapped entirely. Citizenship made insanely hard. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...