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posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday February 27 2018, @09:05AM   Printer-friendly
from the why-did-the-chicken-cross-the-racetrack dept.

In a quest to learn how two-legged dinosaurs moved, scientists watched their descendants — birds — run around on a race track. After all, chickens were once carnivorous dinosaurs that stalked the Earth on giant drumsticks.

For all the movies that show dinosaurs chasing after humans, we don't actually know much about what a walking or running dinosaur looked like. Footprints and fossils, for example, can't tell us whether a dino strode or strutted. "They're static records of an animal or its movement," says Peter Bishop, a scientist at the Queensland Museum. For movement, he says, "That's when you've got to study animals that are living today."

Only, there aren't any dinosaurs wandering around anymore. So Bishop and his colleagues turned to the next best thing: birds, the only surviving descendants of two-legged dinos called theropods. Bishop and his colleagues rounded up a dozen species from cute little quail and turkeys to long-legged ostriches and emus. Then they sent the birds walking and running down a racetrack.

Source: https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/24/17046554/birds-track-non-avian-theropods-locomotion-dinosaurs-running


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  • (Score: 1, Offtopic) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday February 27 2018, @09:49AM (2 children)

    by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Tuesday February 27 2018, @09:49AM (#644547) Homepage Journal

    ... ostrich eggs Benedict.

    "Heart-stoppin' good!" -- Lizard-Man Ibarreta

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    Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Freeman on Tuesday February 27 2018, @06:03PM

      by Freeman (732) on Tuesday February 27 2018, @06:03PM (#644710) Journal

      I don't know about Ostrich Eggs, but apparently Emu Eggs taste good. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJpgRdv92nU [youtube.com] Just don't follow it up with some nasty egg thing from a convenience store.

      --
      Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @01:54AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @01:54AM (#644921)

      Giant drumsticks? Oh boy, lead on dear sir, to the era-matching Giant KFC...

  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday February 27 2018, @01:15PM (3 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Tuesday February 27 2018, @01:15PM (#644600)

    The physiology is roughly similar, so they'll get good "natural" movement, but gait is as much learned from development in the environment as it is dictated by genetics and mechanics. What I'm saying here is: they're unlikely to get "true" dinosaur movement, but there's no better evidence around to refute their results.

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    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday February 27 2018, @03:41PM (2 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday February 27 2018, @03:41PM (#644646) Journal

      but gait is as much learned from development in the environment as it is dictated by genetics and mechanics

      I doubt you'll see many humans learning to run around on six legs. Body structure, which based on genetics and mechanics, strongly limits what gaits an animal can possibly have. Even if there are environment differences, one merely needs to look at enough animals to find all those differences.

      A more serious problem is that gait mechanics greatly changes as one increases body size. As Sourcery42 indicated, the jerky movement of small animals just isn't going to happen in a multi-ton animal.

      • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday February 27 2018, @05:26PM (1 child)

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Tuesday February 27 2018, @05:26PM (#644683)

        strongly limits what gaits an animal can possibly have.

        True, however: there's lots of socio-behavioral variation [google.com] within the available gaits.

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        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday February 28 2018, @04:53PM

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday February 28 2018, @04:53PM (#645248) Journal
          What makes that "lots"? Are we going to measure to the millimeter how much sway there is in the hips?
  • (Score: 2) by Sourcery42 on Tuesday February 27 2018, @02:10PM

    by Sourcery42 (6400) on Tuesday February 27 2018, @02:10PM (#644613)

    with all their jerky quick movements, the way they hop around, bob their heads, and stuff like that. Now picture a 10 - 15 ton feathery lizard moving like that and try not to smile.

  • (Score: 2) by donkeyhotay on Tuesday February 27 2018, @03:15PM (2 children)

    by donkeyhotay (2540) on Tuesday February 27 2018, @03:15PM (#644638)

    What I mean is, when I look at the legs on a model of a t-rex, for instance, the knees bend towards the front. But when I look at the legs of a chicken (or any other bird), the knees bend towards the back. Wouldn't their gaits be different because of this? What am I missing?

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by insanumingenium on Tuesday February 27 2018, @05:47PM (1 child)

      by insanumingenium (4824) on Tuesday February 27 2018, @05:47PM (#644705) Journal
      We've had one, yes. But what about second knees?

      Pardon the source, but this [dailymail.co.uk] was the best drawing of a chicken skeleton I could find in short order. Ironically in an article about trying to make a chicken walk more like a T-Rex. I am not a biologist or archeologist, but the gross scale comparison seems justified, one joint in each direction, the top one easy to miss on a chicken, the bottom one easy to miss on a T-Rex.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @06:38AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 28 2018, @06:38AM (#645002)

    Elephant gaits tend to be a bit different from horses. Camel and giraffe gaits are different from horses too.

    Chickens don't even walk the exact same way ostriches do. Some parts are similar but the other parts are different.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzjorJfvF4U [youtube.com]
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zkhov9pLYBM [youtube.com]

    So a movie depiction of a t-rex walk could have just about as much chance of being as accurate as deriving it from an ostrich.

    Would a T-Rex would move its head the same way as a chicken while walking? :).

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