A New Troodontid Theropod, Talos sampsoni gen. et sp. nov., from the Upper Cretaceous Western Interior Basin of North America

Troodontids are a predominantly small-bodied group of feathered theropod dinosaurs notable for their close evolutionary relationship with Avialae. Despite a diverse Asian representation with remarkable growth in recent years, the North American record of the clade remains poor, with only one controversial species--Troodon formosus--presently known from substantial skeletal remains.Here we report a gracile new troodontid theropod--Talos sampsoni gen. et sp. nov.--from the Upper Cretaceous Kaiparowits Formation, Utah, USA, representing one of the most complete troodontid skeletons described from North America to date. Histological assessment of the holotype specimen indicates that the adult body size of Talos was notably smaller than that of the contemporary genus Troodon. Phylogenetic analysis recovers Talos as a member of a derived, latest Cretaceous subclade, minimally containing Troodon, Saurornithoides, and Zanabazar. MicroCT scans reveal extreme pathological remodeling on pedal phalanx II-1 of the holotype specimen likely resulting from physical trauma and subsequent infectious processes.Talos sampsoni adds to the singularity of the Kaiparowits Formation dinosaur fauna, which is represented by at least 10 previously unrecognized species including the recently named ceratopsids Utahceratops and Kosmoceratops, the hadrosaurine Gryposaurus monumentensis, the tyrannosaurid Teratophoneus, and the oviraptorosaurian Hagryphus. The presence of a distinct troodontid taxon in the Kaiparowits Formation supports the hypothesis that late Campanian dinosaurs of the Western Interior Basin exhibited restricted geographic ranges and suggests that the taxonomic diversity of Late Cretaceous troodontids from North America is currently underestimated. An apparent traumatic injury to the foot of Talos with evidence of subsequent healing sheds new light on the paleobiology of deinonychosaurians by bolstering functional interpretations of prey grappling and/or intraspecific combat for the second pedal digit, and supporting trackway evidence indicating a minimal role in weight bearing

The role of iron in phytoplankton photosynthesis, and the potential for iron-limitation of primary productivity in the sea

Iron supply has been suggested to influence phytoplankton biomass, growth rate and species composition, as well as primary productivity in both high and low NO3− surface waters. Recent investigations in the equatorial Pacific suggest that no single factor regulates primary productivity. Rather, an interplay of bottom-up (i.e., ecophysiological) and top-down (i.e., ecological) factors appear to control species composition and growth rates. One goal of biological oceanography is to isolate the effects of single factors from this multiplicity of interactions, and to identify the factors with a disproportionate impact. Unfortunately, our tools, with several notable exceptions, have been largely inadequate to the task. In particular, the standard technique of nutrient addition bioassays cannot be undertaken without introducing artifacts. These so-called ‘bottle effects’ include reducing turbulence, isolating the enclosed sample from nutrient resupply and grazing, trapping the isolated sample at a fixed position within the water column and thus removing it from vertical movement through a light gradient, and exposing the sample to potentially stimulatory or inhibitory substances on the enclosure walls. The problem faced by all users of enrichment experiments is to separate the effects of controlled nutrient additions from uncontrolled changes in other environmental and ecological factors. To overcome these limitations, oceanographers have sought physiological or molecular indices to diagnose nutrient limitation in natural samples. These indices are often based on reductions in the abundance of photosynthetic and other catalysts, or on changes in the efficiency of these catalysts. Reductions in photosynthetic efficiency often accompany nutrient limitation either because of accumulation of damage, or impairment of the ability to synthesize fully functional macromolecular assemblages. Many catalysts involved in electron transfer and reductive biosyntheses contain iron, and the abundances of most of these catalysts decline under iron-limited conditions. Reductions of ferredoxin or cytochrome f content, nitrate assimilation rates, and dinitrogen fixation rates are amongst the diagnostics that have been used to infer iron limitation in some marine systems. An alternative approach to diagnosing iron-limitation uses molecules whose abundance increases in response to iron-limitation. These include cell surface iron-transport proteins, and the electron transfer protein flavodoxin which replaces the Fe-S protein ferredoxin in many Fe-deficient algae and cyanobacteria