Key Earth Science Links
Jurassic Period—Dinosaurs of the Morrison Formation
Lectures 17 & 18—The Real Jurassic Park.Columbia University. Part of an online lecture series for Dinosaurs and the History of Life. World maps, good summaries of the fossils and depositional environments of the Morrison and Tendaguru Formations. Includes images of the skeletons and skulls of major dinosaurs and cladograms of phylogenetic relationships.
Time of the Titans. British Broadcasting Company. Part of the "Walking with Dinosaurs" series. Provides background information on the Jurassic, including general overviews of climate, landscapes, plate positions, and famous Jurassic dinosaurs, including Allosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Diplodocus, and Stegosaurus. There are several online games, including "Big Al," where you get to play an Allosaurus and try to get from juvenile to adult and three-dimensional dinosaurs. The Dig Deeper section has a special profile about the Morrison Formation.
Dinosaur National Monument. National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. Includes a history of this historic park and its historic dinosaur fossils from the Morrison Formation.
Dinosaurs of Utah, The Morrison Formation. Utah Geological Survey. Short descriptions of common Jurassic dinosaurs from the Morrison Formation, including the state dinosaur of Utah, Allosaurus.
Haddonfield and the Bone Wars. Hoag Levins. Explanation of the first dinosaur found in the United States, and of the "Bone Wars" between paleontologists E.D. Cope and O.C. Marsh.
The Ballad of Big Al. British Broadcasting Co. (BBC). Online story (similar to the BBC’s Allosaurus movie), which tells the story of Big Al, the most complete Allosaurus skeleton found. The story explains some of the fossil evidence used to write the movie.
Allosaurus. Wikipedia. Good overview of Allosaurus, including details of phylogeny, comparisons to other theropods, discoveries, and what scientists have learned about the maladies and injuries large theropods like Allosaurus suffered from studying their bones.
Do we know anything about the kinds of diseases that affected dinosaurs? Scientific American. Short article that lists some of the diseases that dinosaurs are known to have had based on studies of their bones, including those that influenced Big. Al.