Building Tiktaalik

University of Chicago fossil preparator, Tyler Keillor, discusses the iterative process of creating the model for Tiktaalik, the fossil discovery by paleontologist Neil Shubin that fills in the evolutionary gap between fish and land animals.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• fossil
• fish
• tiktaalik
• evolution
• model
• archaeologist
• archeology
• Shubin
• University
• Chicago
• uchicago

[AndromedasWake]

this is so awesome.

i'm really fond of tiktaalik, really inspires me to think about what i might have been if i'd been born 375 million years ago!

[InReasonWeTrust]

Excellent video! What a sweet job.

[huguenot67]

@9pt9 He said it. "...involves alot of speculation".

[makenna88]

I'd keep it in my room, right next to my tiny plastic t-rex

[makenna88]

I want one :(

[PusStephen]

great art, i remember i used to create stuff like that in 5th grade. as far as the fossil goes, i once took a dump in my back yard, and like 5 years later it looked like a fish :O!

[9pt9]

Tiktaalic is NOT a transitional fossil. They never even found the hind quarter of it so they don't even know what it's legs looked like lol.

[MEGslayer]

I...want...YOUR...JOB!

[h2omanz]

artist renderings make great proofs.....

Props to the artistry though

[Phyerbyrd]

All genes that form structures in closely related organisms differ by only a few base pairs. A good amount of junk DNA is actually gene switches, which control when genes are dominant or recessive. No scientist expects to find a seal flipper on a cow; we would expect the gene for the human coccyx to be similar to that of a monkeys tail. All chordate embryos have the same features when theyre first conceived: a head, vermiform torso, pharyngeal sacks beneath the neck and a post-anal tail.

[Phyerbyrd]

All organisms share ancestry to a certain extent. There are numerous examples of homologous genetics; the speech gene in mammals, the gene for thumbs in primates, the gene for tails in chordates, the list goes on. There have been examples of ants being born with extra legs instead of antennae. Analogous features are examples of two separate species evolving to fit the same environment.