Not one, but three Jurassic worlds, in new UK museum exhibition

Yorkshire ’s Jurassic World, at the Yorkshire Museum, includes a pregnant ichthyosaur, a Mesozoic virtual reality experience, and a dinosaur called AlanIf you say the word Jurassic to people in the UK, the chances are that their first thoughts will be of a certain hugely successful film franchise. Most palaeontologists are fine with this, because it gives us an excuse to wheel out our well-honed “all the things that were wrong about the Jurassic Park film” material. If they mention anything else at all, it is likely to be the Jurassic coast, a fantastic piece of tourism branding which ensures that Dorset seaside towns receive a steady stream of fossil-mad families on holiday every summe r.Other British Jurassic outcrops are available, however. In Scotland there are Jurassic outcrops up in the Highlands, and sites on the Inner Hebrides areyielding exciting new discoveries. The north coast of Somerset also has some productive areas, and just like the Jurassic coast rocks found at Lyme Regis, these are part of a swathe of Jurassic rocks running diagonally across the UK from the South coast all the way up to Yorkshire, where they are again seen in all their glory on the North-East coast. A new exhibition at theYorkshire Museum in York, which was opened in March by David Attenborough, celebrates the fossils of the Yorkshire Jurassic.Continue reading...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: Science Fossils Geology Dinosaurs Source Type: news