It's a good time to be alive for those of us fascinated by things that no longer are. 🙂 Big #paleontology news today:

1. A new #Tyrannosaurus species. Unlike most of the other proposed new *T. whateveri* of the last few years, this one looks quite well-supported. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-47011-0

2. The earliest skin impressions ever found from any #amniote. Amniotes are #reptiles and #mammals, basically: animals which can lay eggs on land (or give live birth, in more derived forms) because the #embryo is protected from dessication. This is in contrast to #amphibians, the first #vertebrates to live on land, which absolutely require a long-term water source for reproduction. In that sense amniotes are the first **true** terrestrial vertebrates, and we wouldn't be here without those distant ancestors. https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(23)01663-9

The first will no doubt get about a million times more attention, because *Tyrannosaurus*, but the second is at least as big a deal IMO. Links via Thomas Holtz. I'll try to have my own relatively insignificant thoughts when I get time.