Latest news with #UniversityOfManitoba
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
Move over, Jurassic Park. Manitoba was home to newly discovered 390-million-year-old extinct fish
On a warm, sunny July day, paleontologist Melina Jobbins and her team search an old rock quarry near Lundar, Man., for 390-million-year-old fossils of an extinct fish that swam in what was once a vast inland sea. Jobbins, a postdoctoral fellow at the PaleoSed+ lab at the University of Manitoba's department of earth sciences, spreads a geological map over the hood of her rental car to confirm which era of history they can expect to find fossils from in this area, now part of the Canadian Prairies. "All the orange is Devonian," she tells Kirstin Brink, another paleontologist at the University of Manitoba. The Devonian period is nicknamed the Age of Fishes, Jobbins explains to a CBC reporter. This area is where, in the 1990s, researchers from the University of Manitoba discovered some ancient fossils. They weren't quite sure what they had found, but Jobbins studied them, found a few more fossils and realized it was a brand new discovery — one of the first fish to develop body armour, a jaw and teeth. Jobbins renamed and reclassified the fish as Elmosteus lundarensis, named after the Elm Point Formation, the rock formation it was found in. Her research was published in July's edition of the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology. The remnants of this fish are about 150 million years older than the dinosaurs and only about 1½ metres long, the size of a large Chinook salmon. "We're hoping that we can look for more of these fish and more of the placoderms, more of Elmo and its relatives, as well," she said. Jobbins pointed out the teeth, an eye socket and other features of the fossils in the collection of the university's Geological Sciences Museum. The fish have armour made of dermal bone on the head and thorax, but the rest of the skeleton is made of cartilage, similar to sharks. "This makes them a very important group to understand the origin of bone and the early evolution of bone, as well," Jobbins said. "Also the jaws itself, because this is one of the first fish to develop jaws in the first place, and as well as teeth. They kind of come hand in hand. So understanding how this evolved, how it originated, how we got to having something like what we have today, which is on a whole other level of complexity." Jobbins and her team are visiting more quarries this summer, hoping to find more fossils and answer more questions — what the animal looked like, but also its environment and what the conditions were for the evolution of these features. "We can understand much more of what was present at the time and how diverse … which is incredible." Manitoba is well-known for its fossil record, much of it on display at the Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre in Morden, Man. The province's Tyndall stone has preserved fossils of the world's largest mosasaurs, marine reptiles from the Cretaceous period. As fellow paleontologist Brink scrambled over rocks, pointing out fossils of corals and sponges and relatives of the starfish, she explained that Manitoba is a great place for finding fossils because so many different ages of rock are preserved. "We can see how life has changed through all these different time periods." Many of the rocks have been dug up because mining "just kind of exposed all these fossils by accident, which is really great for us paleontologists," Brink said. On this day, they found a lot of fossils, including some they'll use to teach students in fall, but unfortunately, Elmosteus lundarensis was elusive. They'll try again another time. Still, Virgil Johnson, the reeve of the rural municipality of Coldwell who helped them access the quarries, was delighted. Johnson grew up around here and spent a lot of time in the quarries. "We used to find all these little fossils when we were crawling around out here and going swimming and stuff, so it was actually pretty neat that when you get the experts out here and kind of show you exactly how old things were and what they are," he said. "It's very exciting."
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
Move over, Jurassic Park. Manitoba was home to newly discovered 390-million-year-old extinct fish
On a warm, sunny July day, paleontologist Melina Jobbins and her team search an old rock quarry near Lundar, Man., for 390-million-year-old fossils of an extinct fish that swam in what was once a vast inland sea. Jobbins, a postdoctoral fellow at the PaleoSed+ lab at the University of Manitoba's department of earth sciences, spreads a geological map over the hood of her rental car to confirm which era of history they can expect to find fossils from in this area, now part of the Canadian Prairies. "All the orange is Devonian," she tells Kirstin Brink, another paleontologist at the University of Manitoba. The Devonian period is nicknamed the Age of Fishes, Jobbins explains to a CBC reporter. This area is where, in the 1990s, researchers from the University of Manitoba discovered some ancient fossils. They weren't quite sure what they had found, but Jobbins studied them, found a few more fossils and realized it was a brand new discovery — one of the first fish to develop body armour, a jaw and teeth. Jobbins renamed and reclassified the fish as Elmosteus lundarensis, named after the Elm Point Formation, the rock formation it was found in. Her research was published in July's edition of the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology. The remnants of this fish are about 150 million years older than the dinosaurs and only about 1½ metres long, the size of a large Chinook salmon. "We're hoping that we can look for more of these fish and more of the placoderms, more of Elmo and its relatives, as well," she said. Jobbins pointed out the teeth, an eye socket and other features of the fossils in the collection of the university's Geological Sciences Museum. The fish have armour made of dermal bone on the head and thorax, but the rest of the skeleton is made of cartilage, similar to sharks. "This makes them a very important group to understand the origin of bone and the early evolution of bone, as well," Jobbins said. "Also the jaws itself, because this is one of the first fish to develop jaws in the first place, and as well as teeth. They kind of come hand in hand. So understanding how this evolved, how it originated, how we got to having something like what we have today, which is on a whole other level of complexity." Jobbins and her team are visiting more quarries this summer, hoping to find more fossils and answer more questions — what the animal looked like, but also its environment and what the conditions were for the evolution of these features. "We can understand much more of what was present at the time and how diverse … which is incredible." Manitoba is well-known for its fossil record, much of it on display at the Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre in Morden, Man. The province's Tyndall stone has preserved fossils of the world's largest mosasaurs, marine reptiles from the Cretaceous period. As fellow paleontologist Brink scrambled over rocks, pointing out fossils of corals and sponges and relatives of the starfish, she explained that Manitoba is a great place for finding fossils because so many different ages of rock are preserved. "We can see how life has changed through all these different time periods." Many of the rocks have been dug up because mining "just kind of exposed all these fossils by accident, which is really great for us paleontologists," Brink said. On this day, they found a lot of fossils, including some they'll use to teach students in fall, but unfortunately, Elmosteus lundarensis was elusive. They'll try again another time. Still, Virgil Johnson, the reeve of the rural municipality of Coldwell who helped them access the quarries, was delighted. Johnson grew up around here and spent a lot of time in the quarries. "We used to find all these little fossils when we were crawling around out here and going swimming and stuff, so it was actually pretty neat that when you get the experts out here and kind of show you exactly how old things were and what they are," he said. "It's very exciting."
CBC
3 days ago
- Science
- CBC
Move over, Jurassic Park. Manitoba was home to newly discovered 390-million-year-old extinct fish
On a warm, sunny July day, paleontologist Melina Jobbins and her team search an old rock quarry near Lundar, Man., for 390-million-year-old fossils of an extinct fish that swam in what was once a vast inland sea. Jobbins, a postdoctoral fellow at the PaleoSed+ lab at the University of Manitoba's department of earth sciences, spreads a geological map over the hood of her rental car to confirm which era of history they can expect to find fossils from in this area, now part of the Canadian Prairies. "All the orange is Devonian," she tells Kirstin Brink, another paleontologist at the University of Manitoba. The Devonian period is nicknamed the Age of Fishes, Jobbins explains to a CBC reporter. This area is where, in the 1990s, researchers from the University of Manitoba discovered some ancient fossils. They weren't quite sure what they had found, but Jobbins studied them, found a few more fossils and realized it was a brand new discovery — one of the first fish to develop body armour, a jaw and teeth. Jobbins renamed and reclassified the fish as Elmosteus lundarensis, named after the Elm Point Formation, the rock formation it was found in. Her research was published in July's edition of the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology. The remnants of this fish are about 150 million years older than the dinosaurs and only about 1½ metres long, the size of a large Chinook salmon. "We're hoping that we can look for more of these fish and more of the placoderms, more of Elmo and its relatives, as well," she said. Jobbins pointed out the teeth, an eye socket and other features of the fossils in the collection of the university's Geological Sciences Museum. The fish have armour made of dermal bone on the head and thorax, but the rest of the skeleton is made of cartilage, similar to sharks. "This makes them a very important group to understand the origin of bone and the early evolution of bone, as well," Jobbins said. "Also the jaws itself, because this is one of the first fish to develop jaws in the first place, and as well as teeth. They kind of come hand in hand. So understanding how this evolved, how it originated, how we got to having something like what we have today, which is on a whole other level of complexity." Jobbins and her team are visiting more quarries this summer, hoping to find more fossils and answer more questions — what the animal looked like, but also its environment and what the conditions were for the evolution of these features. "We can understand much more of what was present at the time and how diverse … which is incredible." Manitoba is well-known for its fossil record, much of it on display at the Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre in Morden, Man. The province's Tyndall stone has preserved fossils of the world's largest mosasaurs, marine reptiles from the Cretaceous period. As fellow paleontologist Brink scrambled over rocks, pointing out fossils of corals and sponges and relatives of the starfish, she explained that Manitoba is a great place for finding fossils because so many different ages of rock are preserved. "We can see how life has changed through all these different time periods." Many of the rocks have been dug up because mining "just kind of exposed all these fossils by accident, which is really great for us paleontologists," Brink said. On this day, they found a lot of fossils, including some they'll use to teach students in fall, but unfortunately, Elmosteus lundarensis was elusive. They'll try again another time. Still, Virgil Johnson, the reeve of the rural municipality of Coldwell who helped them access the quarries, was delighted. Johnson grew up around here and spent a lot of time in the quarries. "We used to find all these little fossils when we were crawling around out here and going swimming and stuff, so it was actually pretty neat that when you get the experts out here and kind of show you exactly how old things were and what they are," he said. "It's very exciting." 390-million-year-old fish fossils found in Manitoba quarry 3 minutes ago A University of Manitoba paleontologist has unearthed a new classification of ancient fish. Researchers believe the fish swam 390 million years ago in what was once a vast inland sea.
CTV News
14-07-2025
- CTV News
Man arrested for allegedly threatening people at U of M stadium
A Winnipeg Police Service shoulder patch is seen in Winnipeg, Sept. 2, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/David Lipnowski The Winnipeg Police Service (WPS) made an arrest after four people were threatened at the University of Manitoba's track and field stadium on Saturday. According to police, the incident began around 11:30 a.m. when a man was acting 'aggressively' in the stadium's viewing stands and campus security attempted to get him to leave. Officers said the suspect – who has no connection to the university -- wouldn't cooperate and threatened three security guards and a coach with a rock and a 'pointed hand-fashioned weapon.' Nobody was physically hurt in the incident. When officers got to the scene, they found the man hiding in a nearby retention pond. Police said he refused to come out. After about an hour of trying to communicate with the suspect, police took him into custody. Officers said his erratic behaviour continued and police requested a medical assessment. A 45-year-old man has been charged with possession of a weapon, four counts of assault with a weapon, and four counts of failure to comply with a probation order.
CTV News
09-07-2025
- Health
- CTV News
U of M research finds wildfire ash contributing to phosphate levels in Lake Winnipeg
Dave Konefall sits on the beach with his wife Korey Williams and their two dogs Quinn and Bruce outside their Lake Winnipeg home in Dunnottar on Tuesday July 9, 2025. (Joseph Bernacki/CTV News Winnipeg) Dave Konefall and Korey Williams live on Lake Winnipeg. The permanent residents of Dunnottar walk their dogs on the beach every day. They want future generations to be able to enjoy it as well. 'It makes me concerned for the tipping point for this lake,' Konefall said. 'It's a massive giant lake. It might be a different story for the next generation. A worse story.' News of a new threat to the health of the lake is not welcome. 'If now the wildfires could be considered a detriment as well, it's really sad,' Williams said. 'This lake needs some more friends and fewer enemies.' Dunnottar beach and dogs Konefall and Williams walk their two dogs on the beach every day outside their Dunnottar home. Here they are on Tuesday July 9, 2025. (Joseph Bernacki/CTV News Winnipeg) New research from the University of Manitoba finds the phosphorus fallout from climate change may be impacting Lake Winnipeg. 'We estimated that we should have different sources of phosphorus, including dust from agricultural land or pollen from trees around the lake and another component would be wildfire,' said Dr. Masoud Goharrhoki, a research associate from the Faculty of Agriculture at the University of Manitoba. Goharrhoki has been working with the Lake Winnipeg Research Consortium for the past year. The Namao ship brings teams out on the lake three times a year. This spring they studied the impact of wildfire ash on the lake as a busy wildfire season unfolded. Early findings indicate particulates from the ash contribute to phosphate levels, which increase algal blooms. 'We haven't collected that before, and as far as I know, that aspect of (wildfire ash) as a source (of phosphorus) was not fully understood even in other water bodies, specifically in large water bodies,' Goharrhoki said. U of M Ash Samples At the University of Manitoba, the filter sample on the left was collected during wildfire smoke present over Lake Winnipeg near Gimli this spring. The sample filter on the right was collected before wildfires began. Here are the two samples shown on Tuesday July 9, 2025. (Scott Andersson/CTV News Winnipeg) Williams said she and her husband won't swim in the lake anymore. She worries about her dogs swimming there too. 'Especially with the dogs, you can't really train them not to drink the water,' Williams said. 'That's really unfortunate, seeing as we see this as a lake playground.'
