Student Research

Many Paleoclub members are involved in research, both in paleontology and related fields.  Undergraduate research is generally aided by professors and staff in the geology department who are willing to advise senior theses and independent studies.  The Paleoclub can help introduce students to faculty willing to advise in their field.  Club members have published papers and abstracts in paleontology journals, and have presented their results at annual meetings of both the Geological Society of America (GSA) and the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (SVP). Most recently, a club member traveled to Austin in 2007 to present a poster at the 68th Annual Meeting of SVP.

During the summer of 2007, many Paleoclub members were involved with fieldwork.  For the last several years, the Geology Museum has carried out a dinosaur dig at the Westphal Quarry, in the Morrison Formation of the Big Horn Basin in Wyoming. Among the discoveries were remains of sauropods, Othnielosaurus, fish, theropod teeth, and plant remains.  There is also ongoing work studying vertebrate fossils in Wisconsin caves.

Some topics of research in recent years:

• Taphonomy of dinosaurs in the Jurassic Morrison Formation of Wyoming
• Ornithopod dinosaurs from the Morrison Formation
• Foraminifera from the Paleocene-Eocene boundary
• Trace fossils of trilobites
• Stable isotopes to measure changes over the growth of fossil clams and snails
• Bite marks from Tyrannosaurus rex on fossil bones from the Hell Creek Formation of Montana
• Skeletons of mosasaurs from the Western Interior Seaway
• Sexual dimorphism in archosaurs
• Ostracods from the Miocene of Lake Pannon
  

Field areas:

   Montana (Cretaceous vertebrate)

   Wisconsin (Pleistocene vertebrate and Paleozoic invertebrate)

   Wyoming (Jurassic vertebrate)

   Arizona (Cambrian invertebrate trace fossils)

 

Student funding awards:

 2006          $1790        ASM travel grant                                                          Paleoclub

 

MSSPR:

In 2004 and 2005 we founded and hosted MSSPR, the Midwest Symposium of Student Paleontologic Research, which was invented as a venue for students throughout the midwest to present their research in paleontolgy to other students and professors. Our goal was to provide opportunities for students to take part in research, as well as, opportunities for students with the same interests to come together, share a passion and to reach out to the public.