It was previously thought that the falling spherules, as the tiny rocks are called, heated up the atmosphere by several degrees for up to 20 minutes - hot enough and long enough to cause whole forests to spontaneously burst into flames

The new species, which lived 71 to 75 million years ago, has been named Hollanda luceria, after the punk/country band Lucero and the Holland family, whose donations helped to support the research

At number 7 is the finding of the fossil of Raptorex kriegsteini, a tiny Tyrannosaurus rex, which gave rise to the giant mighty T.Rex

A new analysis by palaeontologists studying a well-preserved skull and partial skeleton of a feathered dinosaur, Sinornithosaurus, living some 125 million years ago in northeast China reveal that it used poison to hunt down its prey

Now that an early carnivore fossil has been fully removed from its matrix (this after spending over a century on a shelf because of the associated crushed teeth), scientists are able to re-interpret the evolutionary tree of this group of mammals.

Researchers have discovered a venomous, birdlike raptor that thrived some 128 million years ago in China. This is the first report of venom in the lineage that leads to modern birds.

AP - As efforts falter to save North America’s largest freshwater fish — a toothless beast left over from the days of dinosaurs — officials hope to stave off extinction by sending more water hurtling down a river so the fish can spawn in the wild.

AP - The skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex will make its museum debut at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry along the banks of the Willamette River.

AP - A skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex will spend much of 2010 along the banks of the Willamette River at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry.

AP - Newly described dinosaur fossils from New Mexico are helping scientists better understand the early development of these ancient creatures. The 6-to-12 foot-long, meat-eating creature, Tawa hallae, is described in Friday’s edition of the journal Science.