Science
Magazine
assignment
Assignment: Summary paper of a science article related to Historical Geology.
Due: Friday, May 11, 2007
Description:
Choose an article
from a mainstream
science magazine
(for example,
American Scientist,
or Scientific
American. These
magazines are
available from the
CRC library.) Read
it. Write a 2 page
paper (~500 words)
that include the
following sections:
1) Summarize
the article
2) Explain how
the article
relates to
what we have
covered in
Historical
Geology.
Historical Geology - related Articles
Chapter 6
Taylor, R. E., 2000, "Fifty Years of Radiocarbon Dating", American Scientist, v. 88, no.
1 (January-February 2000).
Chapter 7
 Grant, Peter R. and Grant, B. Rosemary, 2002, "Adaptive Radiation of Darwin’s
Finches", American Scientist, v. 90, no. 2 (March-April 2002).
Chapter 8
 Gurnis, Michael, 2001, "Sculpting the Earth from Inside Out", Scientific American, v.
284, no. 3, pp. 40-47 (March 2001).
 Murphy, J. Brendan and Nance, R. Damian, 2004, “How Do Supercontinents
Assemble?” American Scientist, v. 92, no. 4 (July-August 2004).
Chapter 9

Murphy, J. Brendan; Oppliger, Gary L.; Brimhall, George H., Jr.; and Hynes; Andrew,
1999; "Mantle Plumes and Mountain Building"; American Scientist, v. 87, no. 2 (MarchApril 1999).
Chapter 11

Warmflash, David, & Weiss, Benjamin, 2005, "Did Life Come from Another World,"
Scientific American, vol. 293, no. 5, pp. 64-71 (November 2005).
 Valley, John W., 2005, "A Cool Early Earth?" Scientific American, v. 293, no. 4, p. 5865 (October 2005).
 Russell, Michael, 2005, "First Life," American Scientist, v. 94, no. 1, p. 32.
 Hazen, Robert M., 2001, "Life's Rocky Start", Scientific American, v. 284, no. 4, pp. 7685 (April 2001).
 Lutz, Richard A.; Shank, Timothy M.; Evans, Robert, 2001, "Life After Death in the
Deep Sea", American Scientist, v. 89, no. 5 (September-October 2001).
 Delsemme, Armand, 2001, "An Argument for the Cometary Origin of the Biosphere",
American Scientist, v. 89, no. 5 (September-October 2001).
Chapter 12

Hoffman, Paul F., and Schrag, Daniel P., 2000; "Snowball Earth", Scientific American,
v. 282, no. 1, p. 68-75 (January 2000).
 Bottjer, David J., 2005, "The Early Evolution of Animals," v. 293, no. 2, p. 42-47.
Chapter 13
Fortey, Ricard A., 2004, “The Lifestyle of the Trilobites,” American Scientist, v. 92, no.
5, p. 446- (September-October 2004).
 Droser, M.L., R.A. Fortey, and X. Li, 1996, "The Ordovician Radiation," American
Scientist, v. 84, pp. 122-131.
 Erwin, D., J. Valentine, and D. Jablonski, 1997, "The Origin of Animal Body Plans,"
American Scientist, v. 85, pp. 126-137.
Chapter 14


Clack, Jennifer, 2005, "Getting a leg up on Land." Scientific American, vol.293, no. 6,
pp. 100-107.
 Shipman, Pat, 2006, "Missing Links and Found Links," American Scientist, v. 94, no. 6,
p. ?
 Turner, Susan, and Miller, R.F.; 2005, "New Ideas About Old Sharks, " American
Scientist, v. 93, no. 3, p. 244-.
Chapter 16


Padian, K., and L.M. Chiappe, 1998; "The Origin of Birds and Their Flight," Scientific
American, February 1998.
Flynn, John J. and Wyss, Andre R., Feb. 2002; "Madagascar's Mesozoic Secrets,"
Scientific American, v. 286, no. 2, p. 54-63.
Motani, Ryosuke, 2000, "Rulers of the Jurassic Seas", Scientific American, v. 283, no.
6, pp. 52-59 (December 2000).
 Prum, Richard O. and Brush, Alan, 2003, “Which Came First, the Feather or the Bird?”
Scientific American, v. 288, no. 3, p. 84-93 (March 2003).
 Horner, John R.; Padian, Kevin; Ricoles, Armand de, "How Dinosaurs Grew So Large - and so small," Scientific American, v. 293, no. 1, p. 56-63.
Chapter 17


Thomson, K. S., 2005; "American Dinosaurs: Who and What Was First?" v. 94, no. 2
(March-April), p. ?
 Erickson, Gregory M., 1999; "Breathing Life into Tyrannosaurus rex", Scientific
American, v. 281, no. 3, p. 42-49 (September 1999).
 Abler, William L., 1999; "The Teeth of the Tyrannosaurs", Scientific American, v. 281,
no. 3, p. 50-51 (September 1999).
 Thomas, David A. and Farlow, James O., 1997; "Tracking a Dinosaur Attack", Scientific
American, v. 277, no. 6, p. 74-79 (December 1997).
 Johnson, Claudia C., 2002, "The Rise and Fall of Rudist Reefs", American Scientist, v.
90, no. 2 (March-April 2002).
 Kring, David A. and Durda, Daniel D., 2003, "The Day the World Burned," Scientific
American, vol. 289, no. 6, p. 98-105 (December 2003).
Chapter 18


McGowran, B., 1990, "Fifty Million Years Ago," American Scientist, v. 78, p. 30-39.
Wolfe, J., 1978, "A Paleobotanical Interpretation of Tertiary Climates in the Northern
Hemisphere," American Scientist, v. 66, p. 694-903.
 Wong, Kate, 2002, “The Mammals That Conquered the Seas,” Scientific American, v.
286, n. 5 (May 2002).
 Sieqert, Martin J.; Dowdeswell, Julian A.; Svendsen, John-Inge; and Elverhoi, Anders,
2002, “The Eurasian Arctic During the Last Ice Age,” American Scientist, v. 90, no. 1,
p. 32- (January-February 2002).
Chapter 19

Agnew, Neville, and Demas, Martha., 1998; "Preserving the Laetoli Footprints",
Scientific American, v. 279, no. 3, p. 44-55 (September 1998).
 Tattersal, Ian, 2000; "Once We Were Not Alone"; Scientific American, v. 282 no. 1, p.
56-62 (January 2000).
 Begun, David R., 2003, “Planet of the Apes,” Scientific American, v. 289, no. 2, p. 7483 (August 2003)
 Wong, Kate, 2003, “Stranger in a New Land,” Scientific American, vol. 289, no. 5, p.
74-83 (November 2003).
 Wong, Kate, 2003, “An Ancestor to Call Our Own,” Scientific American, v. 54, no. 1, p.
54-63 (January 2003).
Chapter 20






Wong, Kate, 2005, "The Littlest Human" Scientific American, v. 292, no. 2, pp. 56-65
(February 2005).
Esty, Amos; 2005; "Investigating a Mega-Mystery: Two recent studies try to help
unravel the causes of late Pleistocene extinctions," American Scientist, v. 93, no. 5, p.
?
Alley, Richard B. and Bender, Michael L., 1998; "Greenland Ice Cores: Frozen in
Time", Scientific American, v. 278, no. 2, p. 80-85 (February 1998).
Siegert, Martin J.; Dowdeswell, Julian A.; Svendsen, John-Inge; and Elverhoi, Anders,
2002, "The Eurasian Arctic During the Last Ice Age", American Scientist, v. 90, no. 1
(January-February 2002).
Sturm, Matthew; Perovich, Donald K., and Serreze, Mark C., 2003, “Meltdown in the
North,” Scientific American, vol. 289, no. 4, p. 60-67 (October 2003).
Bindschadler, Robert A. and Bentley, Charles R., 2002 “On Thin Ice?” Scientific
American, v. 287, n. 6, p. 98-105 (December 2002)
Last update 4/16/2007
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