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Guides to dinosaur science
Each guide opens with a plain-language summary anyone can read, then lets you go deeper section by section. No prior knowledge assumed.
Start hereHow dinosaurs are classifiedWhy every dinosaur has a two-part Latin name, how genus, species and clade fit together, and how the family tree in DinoAtlas is built. 6 min readRead FossilsHow a dinosaur becomes a fossilThe chain of luck between a dinosaur's death and a museum display: burial, mineral replacement, uplift and erosion — and why so little of it survives. 5 min readRead Deep timeHow we know how old a fossil isRadiometric dating, biostratigraphy and rock layers — how paleontologists put a number on a dinosaur, and why ages come as ranges. 6 min readRead Big ideasWhy birds are dinosaursThe anatomical evidence linking birds to theropods, from Archaeopteryx to feathered fossils in China, and what 'non-avian dinosaur' actually means. 5 min readRead Using DinoAtlasReading the fossil mapWhy fossil sites cluster in deserts and badlands, what paleo-coordinates show, and how to tell a real distribution from a collecting bias. 5 min readRead Big ideasWhat killed the dinosaursThe Chicxulub impact, the Deccan Traps, and the evidence for how the non-avian dinosaurs disappeared 66 million years ago. 6 min readRead