Progressive Palaeontology 2015

Welcome to our coverage of Progressive Palaeontology, the Palaeontological Association’s conference for early-career academics. This year, the conference was held at the University of Bristol, UK, and chaired by Palaeocast’s very own Joe Keating.

Prof. Michael J. Benton: Welcome

Session 1 – Diversity & Ecology
Zhang, S: Differentiating feeding ecology of successive fossil proboscidean faunas from the Pleistocene of South China

Singh, S: ‘Horns, hooves, & hounds’ – mandibular morphometrics & the macroevolution of North American mammals through the Cenozoic

Topham, M: Extinction geography and sampling of marine invertebrates at the K–Pg boundary

Tennant, J: Environmental drivers of crocodyliform extinction and diversity

Kinsella, C: Terrestrial tetrapods of the Triassic

Ludwig, K: Unearthing the roots of mammalian diversity: the quality of the cynodont fossil record

Session 2 – Early vertebrate evolution
Carpenter, D: Don’t hold your breath: new constraints on atmospheric ρO2 during Romer’s Gap

Brocklehurst, R: Digital dissection of suction-feeding and biting fish

Beckett, H: Revised relationships of fossil Aulopiformes: implications for habitat shifts over the Cretaceous-Palaeogene boundary

Castiello, M: First report of a parasphenoid in Petalichthyida (Placodermi) and its phylogenetic implications

Dearden, R: Assessing evolutionary tempo across gnathostome evolution

Park, H: Nothing but skin and bones – early vertebrate fossils unveil the developmental history of the dermal skeleton

Session 3 – Lightning session
Hearing, T: Quantifying the environmental context of the Cambrian metazoan radiation: a geochemical approach

Bath Enright, O: Putting the Burgess Shale through the washing machine

Fleming, J: The eye of the beholder: Colour vision in trilobites

Stocker, C: Assembling the Early Palaeozoic terranes of Japan

Bestwick, J: New Palaeogene and Neogene hydrocarbon seep molluscs from the Caribbean

Wallace, E: Crocodilians of the Hell Creek Formation of north-west South Dakota USA: an investigation into niche partitioning

Baron, M: Ornithiscian dinosaurs: The evolution of a unique bauplan

Harvey, V: Cayman caves and fossil fauna

Session 4 – Taphonomy, taxonomy and morphology
Colleary, C: Chemically characterising the diagenetic alteration of melanin in soft-bodied vertebrate fossils

Wilson, P: Lifting the anne-lid on phosphatization biases: A proverbial can of worms

Bassett-Butt, L: Lophotrochozoans from the Transantarctic Mountains

Agić, H: Tiny acritarchs with porous vesicle from the Early Cambrian of Estonia and the implications for the fossil record of picoplankton

Muchagata, J: Why does Globicetus (fossil beaked-whale) have a bony sphere inside the head?

Jones, A: The cranial biomechanics of Effigia okeeffeae and its convergence with Ornithomimosauridae