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A peculiar, 220-million-year-old species of burrowing reptiles that evaded scientists has been found, fossilized. A team of National Park Service interns are credited with its discovery. Hidden in a once-vibrant part of Arizona's Petrified Forest National Park, the burgeoning paleontologists unearthed fossils of the Skybalonyx skapter, an "anteater-like reptile" that probably predates dinosaurs, according to findings published this month in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. It's a new species of a reptile previously thought to only live in trees. The unusual Skybalonyx skapter belongs to the group Drepanosaur, often considered the ugly duckling of reptiles (perhaps partly because they bore...

These 230-million-year-old bugs preserved in amber are the oldest yet An international team of scientists working in Italy have found the oldest samples of arthropods preserved in amber — a finding that is 100 million years older than previous fossilized samples. The insects, a fly and two mites, are the first ever to be discovered from the Triassic era. The group's findings will help biologists gain a better evolutionary understanding of these organisms and the time periods within which they developed. Amber droplets can be a goldmine for paleontologists. Even a millimeter sized droplet can contain extremely well preserved specimens...