1.
Permian
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The Permian is a geologic period and system which spans 46.7 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period 298.9 million years ago, to the beginning of the Triassic Period 252.2 Mya. It is the last period of the Paleozoic Era, the following Triassic Period belongs to the Mesozoic Era, the concept of the Permian was introduced in 1841 by geologist Sir Roderick Murchison, who named it after the city of Perm. The Permian witnessed the diversification of the early amniotes into the groups of the mammals, turtles, lepidosaurs. The world at the time was dominated by two known as Pangaea and Siberia, surrounded by a global ocean called Panthalassa. The Carboniferous rainforest collapse left behind vast regions of desert within the continental interior, amniotes, who could better cope with these drier conditions, rose to dominance in place of their amphibian ancestors. The Permian ended with the Permian–Triassic extinction event, the largest mass extinction in Earths history, in which nearly 90% of marine species and it would take well into the Triassic for life to recover from this catastrophe. Recovery from the Permian-Triassic extinction event was protracted, on land, the term Permian was introduced into geology in 1841 by Sir R. I. Murchison, president of the Geological Society of London, who identified typical strata in extensive Russian explorations undertaken with Edouard de Verneuil, the region now lies in the Perm Krai of Russia. This could have in part caused the extinctions of marine species at the end of the period by severely reducing shallow coastal areas preferred by many marine organisms. During the Permian, all the Earths major landmasses were collected into a supercontinent known as Pangaea. The Cimmeria continent rifted away from Gondwana and drifted north to Laurasia, a new ocean was growing on its southern end, the Tethys Ocean, an ocean that would dominate much of the Mesozoic Era. Large continental landmass interiors experience climates with extreme variations of heat and cold, deserts seem to have been widespread on Pangaea. Such dry conditions favored gymnosperms, plants with seeds enclosed in a cover, over plants such as ferns that disperse spores in a wetter environment. The first modern trees appeared in the Permian, the climate in the Permian was quite varied. At the start of the Permian, the Earth was still in an Ice Age, glaciers receded around the mid-Permian period as the climate gradually warmed, drying the continents interiors. In the late Permian period, the drying continued although the temperature cycled between warm and cool cycles, Permian marine deposits are rich in fossil mollusks, echinoderms, and brachiopods. By the close of the Permian, trilobites and a host of other groups became extinct. Terrestrial life in the Permian included diverse plants, fungi, arthropods, the period saw a massive desert covering the interior of Pangaea
2.
Texas
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Texas is the second largest state in the United States by both area and population. Other major cities include Austin, the second most populous state capital in the U. S. Texas is nicknamed the Lone Star State to signify its former status as an independent republic, and as a reminder of the states struggle for independence from Mexico. The Lone Star can be found on the Texan state flag, the origin of Texass name is from the word Tejas, which means friends in the Caddo language. Due to its size and geologic features such as the Balcones Fault, although Texas is popularly associated with the U. S. southwestern deserts, less than 10 percent of Texas land area is desert. Most of the centers are located in areas of former prairies, grasslands, forests. Traveling from east to west, one can observe terrain that ranges from coastal swamps and piney woods, to rolling plains and rugged hills, the term six flags over Texas refers to several nations that have ruled over the territory. Spain was the first European country to claim the area of Texas, Mexico controlled the territory until 1836 when Texas won its independence, becoming an independent Republic. In 1845, Texas joined the United States as the 28th state, the states annexation set off a chain of events that caused the Mexican–American War in 1846. A slave state before the American Civil War, Texas declared its secession from the U. S. in early 1861, after the Civil War and the restoration of its representation in the federal government, Texas entered a long period of economic stagnation. One Texan industry that thrived after the Civil War was cattle, due to its long history as a center of the industry, Texas is associated with the image of the cowboy. The states economic fortunes changed in the early 20th century, when oil discoveries initiated a boom in the state. With strong investments in universities, Texas developed a diversified economy, as of 2010 it shares the top of the list of the most Fortune 500 companies with California at 57. With a growing base of industry, the leads in many industries, including agriculture, petrochemicals, energy, computers and electronics, aerospace. Texas has led the nation in export revenue since 2002 and has the second-highest gross state product. The name Texas, based on the Caddo word tejas meaning friends or allies, was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves, during Spanish colonial rule, the area was officially known as the Nuevo Reino de Filipinas, La Provincia de Texas. Texas is the second largest U. S. state, behind Alaska, though 10 percent larger than France and almost twice as large as Germany or Japan, it ranks only 27th worldwide amongst country subdivisions by size. If it were an independent country, Texas would be the 40th largest behind Chile, Texas is in the south central part of the United States of America. Three of its borders are defined by rivers, the Rio Grande forms a natural border with the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas to the south
3.
Oklahoma
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Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central United States. Oklahoma is the 20th-most extensive and the 28th-most populous of the 50 United States, the states name is derived from the Choctaw words okla and humma, meaning red people. The name was settled upon statehood, Oklahoma Territory and Indian Territory were merged, on November 16,1907, Oklahoma became the 46th state to enter the union. Its residents are known as Oklahomans, or informally Okies, and its capital, a major producer of natural gas, oil, and agricultural products, Oklahoma relies on an economic base of aviation, energy, telecommunications, and biotechnology. In 2007, it had one of the economies in the United States, ranking among the top states in per capita income growth. Oklahoma City and Tulsa serve as Oklahomas primary economic anchors, with nearly two-thirds of Oklahomans living within their metropolitan statistical areas. With small mountain ranges, prairie, mesas, and eastern forests, most of Oklahoma lies in the Great Plains, Cross Timbers, interior Highlands—a region especially prone to severe weather. The name Oklahoma comes from the Choctaw phrase okla humma, literally meaning red people, equivalent to the English word Indian, okla humma was a phrase in the Choctaw language used to describe Native American people as a whole. Oklahoma later became the de facto name for Oklahoma Territory, and it was approved in 1890. Oklahoma is the 20th-largest state in the United States, covering an area of 69,898 square miles and it is one of six states on the Frontier Strip and lies partly in the Great Plains near the geographical center of the 48 contiguous states. It is bounded on the east by Arkansas and Missouri, on the north by Kansas, on the northwest by Colorado, on the far west by New Mexico, much of its border with Texas lies along the Southern Oklahoma Aulacogen, a failed continental rift. The geologic figure defines the placement of the Red River, the Oklahoma panhandles Western edge is out of alignment with its Texas border. The Oklahoma/New Mexico border is actually 2.1 to 2.2 miles east of the Texas line, the border between Texas and New Mexico was set first as a result of a survey by Spain in 1819. It was then set along the 103rd Meridian, in the 1890s, when Oklahoma was formally surveyed using more accurate surveying equipment and techniques, it was discovered the Texas line was not set along the 103rd Meridian. Surveying techniques were not as accurate in 1819, and the actual 103rd Meridian was approximately 2.2 miles to the east and it was much easier to leave the mistake than for Texas to cede land to New Mexico to correct the surveying error. The placement of the Oklahoma/New Mexico border represents the true 103rd Meridian, cimarron County in Oklahomas panhandle is the only county in the United States that touches four other states, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and Kansas. Its highest and lowest points follow this trend, with its highest peak, Black Mesa, at 4,973 feet above sea level, situated near its far northwest corner in the Oklahoma Panhandle. The states lowest point is on the Little River near its far southeastern boundary near the town of Idabel, Oklahoma, which dips to 289 feet above sea level
4.
Edward Drinker Cope
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Edward Drinker Cope was an American paleontologist and comparative anatomist, as well as a noted herpetologist and ichthyologist. He was a founder of the Neo-Lamarckism school of thought, born to a wealthy Quaker family, Cope distinguished himself as a child prodigy interested in science, he published his first scientific paper at the age of 19. Though his father tried to raise Cope as a gentleman farmer, Cope married his cousin and had one child, the family moved from Philadelphia to Haddonfield, New Jersey, although Cope would maintain a residence and museum in Philadelphia in his later years. Cope had little formal training, and he eschewed a teaching position for field work. He made regular trips to the American West, prospecting in the 1870s and 1880s, a personal feud between Cope and paleontologist Othniel Charles Marsh led to a period of intense fossil-finding competition now known as the Bone Wars. Copes financial fortunes soured after failed mining ventures in the 1880s and he experienced a resurgence in his career toward the end of his life before dying on April 12,1897. Though Copes scientific pursuits nearly bankrupted him, his contributions helped to define the field of American paleontology and he was a prodigious writer, with 1,400 papers published over his lifetime, although his rivals debated the accuracy of his rapidly published works. He discovered, described, and named more than 1,000 vertebrate species, including hundreds of fishes and his proposal for the origin of mammalian molars is notable among his theoretical contributions. Copes rule, however, the hypothesis that mammalian lineages gradually grow larger over geologic time, Edward Drinker Cope was born on July 28,1840, the eldest son of Alfred and Hanna Cope. The death of his mother when he was three years old seemed to have had effect on young Edward, as he mentioned in his letters that he had no recollection of her. His stepmother, Rebecca Biddle, filled the role, Cope referred to her warmly, as well as his younger stepbrother. Alfred, a member of the Religious Society of Friends or Quakers, operated a lucrative shipping business started by his father, Thomas P. Cope. He was a philanthropist who gave money to the Society of Friends, the Philadelphia Zoological Gardens, Edward was born and raised in a large stone house called Fairfield, whose location is now within the boundaries of Philadelphia. The 8 acres of pristine and exotic gardens of the house offered a landscape that Edward was able to explore. The Copes began teaching their children to read and write at a young age, and took Edward on trips across New England and to museums, zoos. Copes interest in animals became apparent at an age, as did his natural artistic ability. Alfred intended to give his son the same education he himself had received. At age nine, Edward was sent to a day school in Philadelphia and in 1853 at the age of 12, Edward was sent to the Friends Boarding School at Westtown, near West Chester, Pennsylvania
5.
Tetrapod
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The superclass Tetrapoda contains the four-limbed vertebrates known as tetrapods, it includes living and extinct amphibians, reptiles and mammals, as well as earlier extinct groups. The first tetrapods appeared by the late Devonian,367, the first tetrapods were primarily aquatic. Their descendants drove most amphibians to extinction as they began to dominate, the amniotes include the tetrapods that further evolved for flight—such as birds from among the dinosaurs, and bats from among the mammals. The change from a plan for breathing and navigating in water to a body plan enabling the animal to move on land is one of the most profound evolutionary changes known. It is also becoming increasingly well-understood as a result of more transitional fossil finds, many tetrapods have returned to partially aquatic or fully aquatic lives throughout the history of the group. Tetrapods can be defined in cladistics as the nearest common ancestor of all living amphibians and all living amniotes, the group so defined is the crown group, or crown tetrapods. The term tetrapodomorph is used for the definition, any animal that is more closely related to living amphibians, reptiles, birds. The group so defined is known as the total group. Stegocephalia is a larger group equivalent to some uses of the word tetrapod. Batrachomorphs are all sharing a more recent common ancestry with living amphibians than with living amniotes. Reptiliomorphs are all sharing a more recent common ancestry with living amniotes than with living amphibians. Tetrapoda includes four classes, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, however, that diversification process was interrupted at least a few times by major biological crises, such as the Permian–Triassic extinction event, which at least affected amniotes. As biodiversity has grown, so has the number of niches that tetrapods have occupied, the first tetrapods were aquatic and fed primarily on fish. Today, the Earth supports a diversity of tetrapods that live in many habitats. Tetrapods evolved from early bony fishes, specifically from the branch of lobe-finned fishes. The first tetrapods probably evolved in the Emsian stage of the Early Devonian from Tetrapodomorph fish living in water environments. The very earliest tetrapods would have been similar to Acanthostega, with legs and lungs as well as gills. The earliest tetrapods inhabited saltwater, brackish-water, and freshwater environments and these traits were shared with many early lobed-finned fishes
6.
Dimetrodon
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Dimetrodon is an extinct genus of synapsid that lived during the Cisuralian Permian, around 295–272 million years ago. It is a member of the family Sphenacodontidae, the most prominent feature of Dimetrodon is the large neural spine sail on its back formed by elongated spines extending from the vertebrae. It walked on four legs and had a tall, curved skull with teeth of different sizes set along the jaws. Most fossils have found in the southwestern United States, the majority coming from a geological deposit called the Red Beds of Texas. More recently, fossils have found in Germany. Over a dozen species have been named since the genus was first described in 1878, Dimetrodon is often mistaken for a dinosaur or as a contemporary of dinosaurs in popular culture, but it became extinct some 40 million years before the first appearance of dinosaurs. Reptile-like in appearance and physiology, Dimetrodon is nevertheless more closely related to mammals than to modern reptiles, Dimetrodon is assigned to the stem-mammals or non-mammalian synapsids, a group traditionally called mammal-like reptiles. This groups Dimetrodon together with mammals in a clade called Synapsida, while placing dinosaurs, reptiles and birds in a separate clade, Sauropsida. Single openings in the skull behind each eye, known as temporal fenestrae, Dimetrodon was probably one of the apex predators of the Cisuralian ecosystems, feeding on fish and tetrapods, including reptiles and amphibians. Smaller Dimetrodon species may have had different ecological roles, the sail of Dimetrodon may have been used to stabilize its spine or to heat and cool its body as a form of thermoregulation. Some recent studies argue that the sail would have been ineffective at removing heat from the body, Dimetrodon was a quadrupedal, sail-backed synapsid. Most Dimetrodon species ranged in length from 1.7 to 4.6 metres and are estimated to have weighed between 28 and 250 kilograms. The largest known species of Dimetrodon is D. angelensis at 4.6 metres, although some Dimetrodon species could grow very large, many juvenile specimens are known. Features such as ridges on the inside of the nasal cavity, the skull of Dimetrodon is tall and compressed laterally, or side-to-side. The eye sockets are positioned high and far back in the skull, behind each eye socket is a single hole called an infratemporal fenestra. An additional hole in the skull, the fenestra, can be seen when viewed from above. The back of the skull is oriented at an upward angle. The upper margin of the skull slopes downward in an arc to the tip of the snout
