1995 in paleontology
Plants
Conifers
Conifer research
- Phipps, Osborne, & Stockey detail permineralized Pinus pollen cones from the Allenby Formations Princeton Chert site. The description is the first to include in-situ pollen ultrastructure and the cones are the oldest Pinus pollen cones that had been described to date. Affiliation with the Princeton chert organ taxa Pinus similkameenensis and Pinus arnoldii was suggested.
Archosauromorphs
Newly named dinosaurs
- Fossil hunters working on behalf of the Royal Saskatchewan Museum discover a large coprolite from a theropod dinosaur in Maastrichtian strata. In 1997 it is sent to coprolite specialist Karen Chin, who determines that this specimen of fossilized feces was attributable to Tyrannosaurus rex. One year later, in 1998, Karen Chin and others publish a joint paper in Nature announcing the finding.
- Paul Sereno lead an expedition to the Kem Kem region of southeastern Morocco. Among the fossils discovered is a partial skull of Carcharodontosaurus saharicus. Significantly, it preserves a "complete and undistorted braincase" which would later be described in detail along with the structure of the inner ear of C. saharicus by Hans C. E. Larsson in 2001.
| Name | Novelty | Status | Authors | Age | Type locality | Country | Notes | Images |
Achelousaurus | Gen et sp nov | Valid | Sampson | Campanian | Two Medicine Formation | United States |
United States