The team from “Jurassic Park” has nothing on Scott Sampson.
The Utah Museum of Natural History hosted a lecture Thursday called “Dinosaurs of the Lost Continent” at Judge Memorial High School in Salt Lake City, featuring Sampson, a U paleontologist and rising star in the dinosaur field. At the same time “Jurassic Park” amazed millions with its rampaging dinosaurs, Sampson said paleontologists revised their theories about the giant lizards to match, given new information8212;and that there is still much more to learn to create an accurate picture of their world.
Sampson, who is part of the museum’s paleontology team as well as the host of the PBS series, “Dinosaur Train,” discussed many topics featured in his newly released book, Dinosaur Odyssey: Fossil Threads in the Web of Life. Many of the ideologies regarding dinosaurs have changed throughout the years, he said. The 1960s versions of slow, somewhat immobile dinosaurs were dramatically reinvented in the 1990s to the “supercharged” versions we know today, Sampson said.
The world humans live in today came about during the 160 million-year existence of dinosaurs, he said.
Sampson also showcased new dinosaurs that Utah paleontologists have discovered in the past few years. A new type of horned dinosaur, yet to be named, was shown in its first public viewing since its discovery in Southern Utah in 2002. The dinosaur had 15 horns, making it different from any of its relatives. It was found in Escalante, in a rugged area known as the Grand Staircase8212;the same location as many other dinosaur discoveries in the state, Sampson said.
“(In Utah), we are so rich with amazing dinosaur fossils,” said Sarah George, the director of the UMNH.
This lecture was the beginning of the museum’s new theme, “Year of the Dinosaur,” she said.
Patrick Harrington/The Daily Utah ChronicleScott Sampson, the UMNH research curator of paleontology, displays some of his findings from Utah?s Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument on Thursday night. Samson?s lecture series in Salt Lake City is promoting his new publication, Dinosaur Odyssey