October 1, 2020 at 11:00 pm

Science Cafe | Random Acts of Anatomy – A Live Guided Tour of WitmerLab, Oct. 5

Lawrence Witmer in his lab.

Ohio University’s Science Cafe series presents Lawrence Witmer and his students—featured in the October issue of National Geographic—discussing “Random Acts of Anatomy – A Live Guided Tour of WitmerLab” at 5 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 5.

In their Science Café, originating directly from the lab, Witmer and several of his graduate and undergraduate students will give a tour of the lab and the various projects, discussing both their methods and discoveries. Oct. 5 also happens to T. rex’s birthday! Tyrannosaurus rex was named 115 years ago, and Witmer will showcase their research on the “tyrant king.”

For 25 years, Witmer and his team have been studying the evolutionary history of life, focusing on dinosaurs and their modern-day relatives, such as birds, crocodilians, and other reptiles. Today, their state-of-the-art lab, known widely as WitmerLab at Ohio University, is home to a vast collection of dinosaur skulls, modern-day skeletons, and freezers loaded with donated natural casualties awaiting anatomical dissection. Witmer is Professor of Anatomy and Chang Professor of Paleontology in the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.

“In some fundamental sense,” Witmer said, “our mission is to flesh out the past—almost literally!” Combining paleontology, biology, and advanced imaging such as CT scanning, Witmer and his team have published extensively on dinosaur anatomy, physiology, function and behavior, exploring how smart dinosaurs were, how they could survive without overheating, how they fed, how sharp were their senses, among other questions.

For further information…

Read the Ohio University announcement about the National Geographic Magazine article: https://bit.ly/3ngKrUx. Read the Nat Geo article: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/family/reimagining-dinosaurs/
Visit the National Fossil Day (NFD) webpage on the U.S. National Park Service’s site: https://www.nps.gov/subjects/fossilday/index.htm. Learn about and download the NFD “Prehistoric Life Coloring Book”: https://www.nps.gov/subjects/fossils/coloring-book.htm.
Check out WitmerLab online:

- WitmerLab: http://www.WitmerLab.com
- YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/witmerlab
- Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/witmerlab
- Sketchfab: https://sketchfab.com/witmerlab
- Instagram (@WitmerLab): https://www.instagram.com/witmerlab/
- Twitter (@WitmerLab): https://twitter.com/WitmerLab

Web video series

Random Acts of Anatomy: http://bit.ly/2ylQcsX
Dissecting with Emily (with Emily Caggiano): http://bit.ly/2f0AUkE

Dig into published research articles mentioned during the livestream.

- Reconstructing soft-tissues and behavior in fossils (Witmer 1995): https://bit.ly/3nfw0ju
- Skull structure in Majungasaurus (Sampson & Witmer 2007): http://bit.ly/2t96lAT
- Skin textures in dinosaurs (Hieronymus et al. 2009): http://bit.ly/2xp60Zt
- Rhino horn growth & form (Hieronymus et al. 2006): http://bit.ly/2fhEsx4
- Stegoceras nasal airflow (Bourke et al. 2014): http://bit.ly/2JI6RLn
- Allosaurus head & neck function (Snively et al. 2013): http://bit.ly/2Ui4rHd
- T. rex brain & sensory behavior (Witmer & Ridgely 2009): http://bit.ly/2BoKIfx
- Air sinuses in T. rex & other dinosaurs (Witmer & Ridgely 2008): http://bit.ly/2JLIC14
- Brain-cooling in T. rex & other dinosaurs (Porter & Witmer 2019): http://bit.ly/2p5ybwB
- Jaw muscles & blood vessels in T. rex (Holliday et al. 2019): http://bit.ly/2k1Hw6p
- Skull mechanics & kinesis in T. rex (Cost et al. 2019): https://bit.ly/2SsXBj7
- Juvenile tyrannosaur Tarbosaurus skull (Tsuihiji et al. 2011): http://bit.ly/2xDNShQ
- Brain structure in sauropods & other dinosaurs (Witmer et al. 2008): http://bit.ly/2x2EfUU
- Brain & crest in lambeosaur Hypacrosaurus (Evans et al. 2009): https://bit.ly/3kh7fRG
- Brains & endocasts in birds (Early et al. 2020a, b): https://bit.ly/3it6sNc, https://bit.ly/32pnZA1
- Physiology of nasal airflow in ankylosaurs (Bourke et al. 2018): http://bit.ly/2EwOzMO

Support for WitmerLab research provided by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the OU Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine, and the Chang Ying-Chien Professorship of Paleontology.
For help with this livestream, we thank Ohio University Communications and Marketing, the OU Chapter of Sigma Xi, the OU Office of the Vice President of Research & Creative Activity, the OU Research Division, the OU College of Arts and Sciences, the OU Honors Tutorial College, and the OU Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.
Check out upcoming (and archived) Ohio University Science Cafés: https://www.ohio.edu/sciencecafe

WitmerLab has a major presence on social media, including Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Sketchfab. They have hosted two video series, “Dissecting with Emily” (with a former HTC undergrad) and their current “Random Acts of Anatomy” series.

WitmerLab is an official partner of the U.S. National Park Service’s National Fossil Day, and this Science Café is a sanctioned National Fossil Day event.

The series is supported by the Ohio University Research Division and Ohio University Chapter of Sigma Xi. For more information visit the Science Cafe website.