coloradosprings.dmns.orgOFFICIAL Denver Museum of Nature & Science : Rise of the Mammals

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Visit the Museum Shop earth sciences Rise of the Mammals Corral Bluffs Field Notes Colorado Springs Fossils Learn more After the Asteroid: Earth’s Comeback Story Press Room Colorado Discovery Rocks the World Sixty-six million years ago, a meteorite larger than Mount Everest slammed into Earth and 75 percent of species went extinct in a geologic blink of an eye, including nonavian dinosaurs. For decades, scientists worked to determine how the planet and living creatures rebounded, yet continued to know very little about the recovery. Until now. A remarkable new trove of fossils has been unearthed in Colorado—a discovery that reveals one of the most important but least understood chapters in the history of life. It’s an unprecedented look at the time when the great dinosaurs were replaced by our own group, the mammals, and the world as we know it began. Rise of the Mammals When the Cataclysm Struck The Light Bulb Moment Cracking the Code The Publications Meet the Team 2021 End-of-Year Update Rise of the Mammals When the Cataclysm Struck Sixty-six million years ago, a meteorite larger than Mount Everest slammed into Earth. This was the single worst day for life on our planet, when 75 percent of species went extinct in a geologic blink of an eye. Obviously, the planet and living creatures rebounded. Humans are testament to the recovery of life. But how did it happen? For decades, scientists have tried to squeeze every bit of data possible out of the rocks from the first million years after the dinosaur extinction. But, the results of over 100 years of hammering away are just fragments of teeth, an occasional jaw, and an ultra-rare skull once every few decades. As a consequence, we don’t know much about the mammals that survived. Until now. The discovery of an extraordinary treasure trove of fossils near Colorado Springs by Drs. Tyler Lyson and Ian Miller reveals in striking detail how life recovered after the catastrophic asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. Their new research, published in Science magazine, paints a vivid portrait of the first million years after the impact. The Light Bulb Moment A monumental breakthrough occurred in 2016 when Lyson and Miller concentrated their efforts in an area called Corral Bluffs. They believed this Denver Basin locale showed promise because a handful of relatively complete vertebrate fossils had been found there over the decades. So, they set their eyes to the ground, looking for bits of bone, the way they were trained to find fossils. They came up with only fragments. However, Lyson was convinced they weren’t keying in on the right material, perhaps not seeing what was right in front of their noses. He recalled his fossil hunting experience with South African colleagues in the deserts of the Karoo, where the key to finding fossils was not searching for bone fragments but for a particular kind of rock called a concretion. So what if the team searched Corral Bluffs for concretions instead of the usual bone? It was the light bulb moment that changed the game completely. Cracking the Code The team went back to the site, but this time they set their eyes on finding concretions. It wasn’t long before Lyson picked up a knobby, whitish-colored rock that looked more like a rotting loaf of bread than anything else. With a single, well-placed crack of his rock hammer, Lyson split open the concretion and saw the cross-section of a complete mammal skull staring back at him. He was completely stunned. After 20 years of combing the badlands of North Dakota for elusive fossils from just after the extinction of the dinosaurs, Lyson was holding the best fossil he’d ever found from this important slice of time. Miller and Lyson looked around and saw the same unassuming concretions covering the ravines and gullies. In a frenzy, they gently cracked open concretions at their feet and in no time found four more complete mammal skulls. Paleontologists who study this time period go whole careers without finding one complete mammal skull from this time period; Miller and Lyson found four in just a couple of hours! They had cracked the code. Lyson and Miller and their excavation team spent about 10,000 hours in the field at Corral Bluffs, working through blazing sun, torrential rain, and...