Reimagining Dinosaurs with Women of Impact | National Geographic

Okay, hi! I think we're good to go. Welcome everybody! Um, today's Women of Impact panel on reimagining dinosaurs, and we've got three incredible women paleontologists around the world, with London and the United States represented today in this panel. Um, and this is going to be about reimagining dinosaurs but also some other animals too, not just dinosaurs. We have experts in other types of vertebrate animals around, so we're doing this today because of National Geographic's October magazine cover story about reimagining dinosaurs. It's just this incredible overview and look at all the research that's being done around the world in paleontology that has changed so much over the past decades. It's not, you know, necessarily what we're used to and what most people are used to seeing. There's a lot more technical work that goes on these days, and to quote Michael Greshko, who wrote the cover story, as he says, "Medical scanners, particle accelerators, and chemical analyses are letting researchers virtually separate rock from bone and see fossils' tiniest hidden features." So that's what, yeah, that's a great way to describe what these three women do.

My name is Shana Montanari. I'm going to be the moderator of this panel today. I am a paleontologist. I got my PhD at the American Museum of Natural History, which is where I am now, is from my background. I'm not actually there; I'm in Phoenix, Arizona right now. I did my PhD there and I did some paleontological research for about 10, I guess 10 total years. And then I'm a journalist now, so I'm a paleontologist turned journalist. I have written for a variety of publications, National Geographic being one of them, sort of kicked off my career in science journalism. So that's what I do now, and it's great because I still get to talk to my old friends and colleagues and talk to them about paleontology.

So I will do a little run-through of who we have here today to talk to. Um, and if anyone watching has questions, you can feel free to ask them, and I will get some of those towards the end of the chat probably. So I'll—if there's anything I haven't asked, you can ask it.

So I'll start off with Yazina Vaiman. She is a molecular paleontologist who researches the chemistry of fossilization, and right now she is in Connecticut because she is a PhD candidate at Yale University and looking to finish up her degree soon. And we have Dr. Bullard Minjin. She is a National Geographic explorer; she is from Mongolia. And the list of accolades for Dr. Minjin goes on and on; I cannot possibly get through all of them. She famously helped stop the sale of a Mongolian dinosaur in 2012 that had left the country illegally via smuggler. She is the founder of the Institute for the Study of Mongolian Dinosaurs. And we also have Dr. Anjali Goswami. She is now a research leader in life sciences at the Natural History Museum in London, and she's an honorary professor at University College London. She studies the evolution and development of vertebrates, using very interesting techniques such as 3D imaging. So that's just a brief introduction. You all have incredibly long lists of things that you research and topics you research, so we can touch on a lot more of that into the conversation.

But I just have a question for everybody to start off. I would love for you to expand on what your primary research focus is first, and you know, now that speaking of reimagining, you know, now that it's 2020, how has your research focus and the ideas that you've dreamed up about how to look at extinct animals changed throughout your career? Um, I've noticed that from when I started, you know, 15 years ago, completely different questions are being asked and answered these days, so I would just like to hear about that journey for all of you.

Um, I guess we can start with Anjali.

"Great! Well, thank you first of all for inviting me to be a part of this, and I'm really looking forward to talking with everybody and hearing all the questions that come in. Um, so I would say my research is really focused on reconstructing the evolution of organismal shape or organismal form. And so we use 3D imaging to really capture the shape of organisms, usually their skeletons, especially their skulls actually, in really high detail. And then we use or we develop methods to basically quantify or represent the shape of the skull as mathematical variables and then reconstruct how it's evolved over hundreds of millions of years. And this is something that's really interesting both for just understanding how species evolved. We can start to look at factors like is it because of where they live, like habitat, or is it what they eat, or is that how they develop? Are they egg-laying animals, or are they live-bearing animals? And how do all these different factors really shape the evolution of how animals look and why some animal groups are so diverse, like birds, and other animal groups are really not very diverse, like crocodiles? Um, and of course everything in between, which are dinosaurs. Um, and so this was, that's what we've been working on really for about 20 years in my group now. Um, and how that's changed over the past few decades that I've been in this field is pretty immense actually. Um, so right now what we've been working on over the last, you know, several years, and especially this year when we've kind of not had very much access to our collections is taking these digital data sets, these big 3D digital data sets, and analyzing them, you know, with our computers that we have at home now. And if we were doing this five years ago even, it would have been impossible. We would not have had this data available to us, but just with all the new access to CT scanners, we have these nice handheld scanners that we've been traveling around the world collecting 3D scans of thousands of specimens. If we didn't have that data, we would have been really stuck this year, but actually because of really the growth in digital data, 3D data, and really the push for everybody to share these data online, and you can actually get thousands of specimens from online resources, and that really opens up a whole new world of what we can do in terms of developing new methods, reconstructing really the history of life in amazing detail in a way that just was unthinkable when I was first starting out as a faculty member and certainly when I was a graduate student."

"How about you, Yazina?"

"Generally, I'm interested in the preservation of fossil organic matter of alkynes, particularly focused on biomolecules. So when we talk about biomolecules, I mean proteins, lipids, sugars, pigments. Um, all kinds of sort of like molecular compounds that make an organism function and make it look the way it does. And so I'm not only interested in how they fossilize and how they preserve and sort of like what is left after millions and millions and potentially billions of years, but we're sort of like exploring modes of preservation and fossilization to customize proxies. Um, so basically marker signatures that can tell us more about the biology of extinct animals. And so they were really going kind of new ways, at least I hope so. And we're looking particularly at how we can use molecular signatures to learn more about the relationships, about the physiology, about the metabolism, about the behavior of extinct animals. And so the whole aim is ultimately to paint a more colorful and more lively picture of what happened in the past and ultimately understand how life reacted in the past major environmental challenges, because I mean, I guess that's something that's very timely with the current situation of global climate change. So, yeah, we're trying to use the past sort of like as a molecular key to do a better job in protecting biodiversity at some point in the future. And yes, if I would have to think about it, like what changed over the past years, I mean, I guess there has been a lot of technological innovations I guess that kind of like ties right in with what Anjali just said. Um, so when we're looking at the kinds of instruments that people use to analyze fossils and fossil organic matter and molecules, that has definitely changed quite a lot in the past. So when I started out, oh god, as an undergraduate student, everyone was all about mass spectrometry. People are still all about mass spectrometry, but um, we started to explore approaches that come more from in-situ analytics, but basically means that we look at fossils the way they are without, you know, grinding them down, powdering them down, dissolving them into something. Um, we basically like take whole dinosaur bones and we can analyze them the way they are using methods like infrared spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, um, methods that are really evolving super fast at the moment and, uh, like going into clinical fields that are currently growing big and all kinds of biological and material science characterization. As on aspects of aspects of science, and so these methods evolve really fast; we get better instruments, and I feel like that is helping a lot to sort of like move the understanding of what preserves in fossils in deep time from looking only at, you know, like individual case studies where we have the interesting preservation of, I don't know, let's say protein residues in one fossil to really doing big picture research."

"Yeah, it's amazing! What about Bullard? What are you—You've had a great career; I'm sure a lot you have a lot of to say about this?"

"Yeah, well, um, for me, it's a little bit of different story. So my research actually focused on Mesozoic mammals. So mammals actually lived at the same time as dinosaurs. I mean, of course, you know, we focus saying, you know, a lot on dinosaurs; they were other vertebrates living at the same time. So one of them is mammals. So the group I especially focused on is called multi-tuberculate; it means it has multiple cusps on its teeth; so that's the name. Uh, the name came from, so especially I looked at those group of mammals from Mongolia, because Mongolian fossils, you know, vertebrate fossils overall have really nicely preserved means that you can find like almost complete skeletons. So if you have a complete skeleton, you can get a lot of data and information. So my focus was basically, you know, reconstructing the family tree for this mammal group. And so even this group has known like over 80, 90 species being known, uh, only been known by, you know, partial parts of skull or teeth, you know, like parts of the bones. Um, so because I had, you know, some number of skeletons from Mongolia, that really allowed me to see the whole skeleton, to study, collect the data to make the family tree much more, you know, informative in it to that we can collect. So, but of course, um, for me, my main focus actually shifted to more advocacy for protecting and preserving, especially for Mongolian dinosaurs, and I really, really, um, dedicated my time to outreach, reaching out to public and kids, and probably we'll talk that later as I will share more things about it."

"Yes, I have many questions about that and a lot of other things, so I'll keep going. So I have some specific questions that each one of your research topics sort of remind me of, and I guess I'll start with, uh, Yazina, your research jumps out to me as something that, you know, gosh, you know, not even that long ago, 15 years ago, 20 years ago, we would have been like, 'You can't do that! Like that's not— That's—You can't look at the chemical composition of a fossil and have it mean anything, and proteins and the color of feathers and eggs, and you know, people would have said, 'No way! That would have been maybe one of the things that someone would have said you wouldn't, you'll never really know what that is!' And I'm sure you've probably encountered some of that attitude when you tell people about your research, um, you know, as the years have gone on. But I feel like probably as the years have gone on, people have seen, 'Wow, like this is— This is really the real deal, and it's something new and interesting we can do.' Um, you know, what inspired you to just sort of look beyond what people thought was possible and you know, try to and make it make possible?"

"Well, that all really started out when I was a very, very young, probably teenager. I decided I was always excited to study dinosaurs and by previous target life of all kinds, but I also really love chemistry as a method. And so like when I was a teenager, that was like right about the time when Mary Schweitzer was publishing some of her greatest articles on protein preservation in Tyrannosaurus bones, things that are sort of like, you know, crazy if you think about it like from a chemical perspective. And that was also right about the time when Jacob Winter was graduating from his PhD and was publishing all this fascinating work on melanosomes and fossil color. So it was really a product of the moment where I decided, 'Well, you know, I think chemistry could be actually a very useful tool to maybe get a better idea of life, you know, in the past.' And that's when I started to study chemistry and fell in love with chemical methods, and ultimately went on to really become a paleontologist and use that chemical knowledge. Um, and yeah, I mean I guess, you know, like that all started out when ultimately like I decided to write a thesis on a more comprehensive topic. So I didn't only want to look at one fossil and reconstruct the color or look at, you know, one particular bond and understand if there are any kind of molecular residue preserved, but I wanted to look at everything I could get from the collection. And so I would just, you know, pack these like boxes full of specimens and take them to the lab, and I guess at that point it was just pure luck. We were lucky to find very, very obvious patterns in our data. And I guess from that point onwards everything has been more of a collaborative effort in our field, and I think that's really what we're changing our perception of what can preserve in a fossil and what not. This is really a huge team effort."

"Yeah, right! The team effort is a big thing as you start to use all these different instruments that are in different countries, and you have to work as a team a lot more than maybe some paleontologists, you know, of days of yore a long time ago ever had to do. That's incredible! I mean, I remember reading about one of your first preprints about eggshell color; I included it in my dissertation! Um, and I was like, 'Wow, like I didn't— You know, I never would have thought about this!' And I was over there with the mass spectrometer. Um, you know, for people who don't know, you generally, to use those, you have to crush up the fossils so they can be analyzed, which is what I was doing. So I was trying not to use any nice fossils for that, but as you're saying you can do it in situ; you can use the actual bone! So you have the ability to analyze really famous specimens and not damage them, right?"

"Yeah, I think that is like one of the really exciting things that comes along with new technology that, you know, like in, I guess, biology and then medicine, it's not that important, you know, if you like take a small tissue sample and you sample it destructively because usually there's a huge, you know, like— There's a huge resource in terms of like, you know, getting tissue samples, getting, I don't know, specimen samples from biological collections, because we have these things around today. But every fossil is sort of like a unique, I guess a unique, you know, evidence of life in the past, and you know, as paleontologists, I guess it is like really helpful to not having to crush up your fossils, especially because it also eliminates a lot of paperwork with collections managers! So, yeah, I guess another key to like, you know, being able to analyze many fossils at a time is reducing the amount of bureaucracy with it and simply not damaging the fossils."

"Yeah! But it's like so funny that you mentioned that you read my paper, because back then when I handed in my dissertation, I read your papers on dinosaur eggshells and icebox, and I actually cited them in my thesis back then!"

"Oh, that's great! Yeah, we've all worked in the same circles for a long time. So it's fun to hear that all these years later! But what comes of it, even though I'm not— You're way beyond me now, I—I don't understand you're doing it."

"No, like, you know, I like talking to you now more than actually probably doing research because I can talk about all different topics! So I wanted to, you know, ask, I guess, ask Anjali, you know, we're talking about reimagining dinosaurs, but as you mentioned earlier, you know, you'd work on a lot of different vertebrates. So if someone like Michael Greshka, who wrote this article, was to write reimagining mammals, maybe, or you know, a different group, what do you think would be some of the main points, like what that you've seen in your career?"

"Oh, in terms of mammals? I mean, I think, um, you know, this actually really speaks to a lot of what Bullard has been working on, right? Thinking about Mesozoic mammals in particular, I think that's completely transformed how people think about mammals or at least how I think about mammals, right? Because, you know, we always think about mammals as this like post-dinosaur radiation , and you know, mammals and birds actually, right? So that the, um, you know, the few times I've really dabbled in dinosaurs is mainly because of birds. Um, and what we think of both birds and mammals as, yeah, you know, they were kind of around the Mesozoic, but not really doing very much, and it was really after dinosaurs go extinct that you see this massive explosion and diversification! And that's true, you know, to some extent. I mean, there's certainly this huge diversification that happens, um, after dinosaurs go extinct, um, non-avian dinosaurs, um, but you know, there's a lot of controversy still about exactly when that happened: was it really before they went extinct? But also just that, you know, all these amazing new fossils that people are discovering over the past few decades, um, show that the diversity of Mesozoic mammals is so much more extreme than we thought. And especially I think sometimes I think about the Jurassic, and I think the Jurassic was maybe the best time for mammals in many ways, right? You have this incredible diversity in terms of the ecology where you have these, like, you know, these like beaver-like mammals and these gliding-like mammals and all these crazy mammals running around in the Jurassic, um, you know, so much— so much more than what we thought they used to be, when we thought they were just seeing these little shrew type things running around. And so I feel like that's like maybe the biggest and most exciting thing in like what's been reimagined about mammals over the past few past few decades really is really seeing how—how they were, you know, really incredibly diverse way back when. How that really changes our understanding of, you know, what are the big factors that really shape their evolution and when these key characteristics that we think of as defining mammals, when do they show up and what drove them to be that way, or which of us— I guess we're obviously mammals— which of us to be this way."

"So early on, and then that has knock-on effects for thinking about all the stuff that we used to think of as being the key things for mammals, right? You know, the extinction of the dinosaurs, um, you know, empty niche spaces. You know, that's certainly a big, big factor, but—but there's still a lot of controversy about, you know, when these things happen. And so I think that, um, as time has gone on, maybe we know a little bit less about recent mammals and more about more distant mammals than we used to. Um, so yeah, right now I'm just in the middle of a big project, you know, working on mammal skull evolution, and I feel like we're at this point where I'm actually quite confused about it; and so, yeah, well if you ask me in another month, I'll have a stronger opinion, but right now I think, um, I haven't quite figured out what's going on at the base of the placental mammal tree, at least."

"That's great! I mean, it's so great that we're just figuring these things out now and can use all these new techniques, and as you said, you know, large-scale digital data sets, otherwise, you know, was just traveling around from museum to museum, coding sessions in a notebook, and now—and now look what you can do! And all the amazing things that—that you can do, and I think mammals are going to become more popular now because I saw a tweet about the new Jurassic Park movie; oh sorry, Jurassic World movie, and there's a list of Sauruses in it! So there's discipline Jurassic World movie that will now come out in 2022, not 2021, unfortunately. I just saw Jurassic Park, um, last week for the first time."

"What?!"

"Yeah, I was the only vertebrate paleontologist in the world who hadn't seen it, but my kids wanted to see it, so we watched it."

"Well, I could turn this conversation into what did you think of Jurassic Park? But I will admit that I also was not like a huge Jurassic Park fan. I think a lot of people imagine—this will segue into a question that someone asked from the group of what inspired you to get into paleontology in general. People want to know how you even get started on this sort of road, but um, you know, Jurassic Park came out a little over 25 years ago now, and it inspired people to get into paleontology, I think especially in my generation. I didn't really watch it until recently when I performed it live on stage in New York City at a—at a club called Caveat, where they do science shows, and I was the science expert, I had the whole script, and now I've memorized it, but before that, it was only recently! So, um, that—that was an inspiration for people to get into paleontology, but I’m sure you all have different different stories about how you got into paleontology. I don't know if, um—We'll start with Bullard. How did you start being a paleontologist in Mongolia?"

"Well, I think my story will be different because even now, you know, most of the public in Mongolia really don't know much about dinosaurs. I mean, you know, around the world, Mongolian dinosaurs are quite famous; even Velociraptor, you know, like a Hollywood star. So I think that's the thing; it's kind of, you know, story from Mongolia. When I was growing up, I didn't have much of sources of, you know, things to learn about dinosaurs, like a book or any TV show, you know? So fortunately, my father, he was a paleontologist—he was actually one of the first Mongolian paleontologists. He was trained in Russia in the 1960s, so his research was focused on fossil corals. So corals that dated back 400 million years, so Mongolia used to be under a sea back then, so we have a lot of invertebrate fossils that can be found in Mongolia. So I had, you know, I grew up at home, had a, you know, bookshelf full of Russian books, you know? So, um, so I think for me actually my interest really started later on that, um, maybe I would say when I came to the U.S., you know, after I finished my master’s, which is I focused on fossil corals, but I did have some interest. I really want to know more about dinosaurs, but it was really limited. Even my father, he discouraged me to study dinosaurs because he thinks it would be challenging for me to learn about anatomy because I was a geology student. So, but I still looking for some opportunities, so I had the opportunity to come to the U.S. right after my masters. That's basically, um, Mongolia just opened to Western world that we had, you know, we had the opportunity to travel, um, you know, to countries, except the Soviet Union and, you know, from the socialist countries. So it really opened my eyes in terms of like interest in paleontology, like coming to the U.S. because there were so many sources of information, amazing museums here in the States. Um, so for me really don't have much to, you know, say in childhood things except I've been exposed to, you know, my dad's Russian books."

"What about you, Yazina? You said you were interested in chemistry, so did that—did you sort of get into paleontology that way or was there—have you always liked paleontology and fossils?"

"Well, originally I wanted to be a very traditional dinosaur paleontologist who goes to the field, brushes dust off bones that are readily exposed on the surface and, you know, like find skeletons in museums. That was my idea as a kid. But, yeah, I have always been excited about wildlife of all kinds. I love zoos; I collected insects in the garden. Yeah, it was, I don't know, I guess like a very childish fascination for life out there. And so when I was, um, a little kid, I got— I think three years old, according to my mom; I don't remember that at all—like I desperately wanted to have a book that had undercover pictures, um, a couple of dinosaurs fighting. And so according to my mom, again, this is how everything started! She had to read me from it every night. And I don't know, I feel like it's just like a general fascination with prehistoric life, you know, like life forms that are so different from anything we see around today. Um, I think that's just, you know, absolutely mind-blowing and fascinating. And so, yeah, I mean, generally I've been excited about biology, wildlife, paleontology and then the chemistry kind of happened along the way. And, um, yeah, for a moment, you know, I had like, um, yeah, I was a little bit torn, you know—do I want to be a chemist? Do I want to be a paleontologist? That's my childhood fascination versus this field that is really exciting and, you know, such an interesting approach to thinking about problems as we have it in chemistry. Um, and I was always thought I have to make a choice. So I graduated from high school and so in Germany, you know, you have to pick, like after high school, exactly what you want to study, and then you go right into your bachelor, and it's very specialized from day one. And, um, yeah, so I thought, you know, like do I want to study chemistry? Do I want to study paleontology? I decided I want to go through the paleo routes so I had a stipend before to study chemistry during high school and for four years, I really enjoyed that, and I learned everything about any kind of method I could, and I decided, you know, like the types of questions that really excite me—they are paleontological questions, questions about dinosaur biology, questions about, um, you know, terrestrialization, questions about past life. And so I decided, okay, you know, chemistry, you are a wonderful tool, but paleontology has the exciting questions! What about you, Anjali?"

"I think I'm quite different from, uh, from both of your other guests here because I didn't know that paleontology was a real thing as a field until college, quite frankly. Um, you know, I—I just—it wasn't something I was kind of aware of, I mean, I did have like, you know, little cards and books about fossils, like most kids growing up, but I just—it never really occurred to me that that was a real job that people could have. Um, so for me, it was very much, you know, I always have loved animals. I've always loved camping. My parents would take us camping quite a lot when I was younger, um, and hiking and things, and so I always really loved like biology and nature. And so when I went to—when I went to college, I wanted to be a biology major, and I was at Michigan, and, um, and there was, you know, there was all kinds of great classes there. So I was a biology major. And, um, and actually, to be honest, it probably comes out—I went to a party my freshman year, and somebody else that was at this party, um, we were talking about like camping and how much we both really like camping and places we like to go camping, and she said that she was signed up for a geology class that was eight credits over the summer that was, um, like six weeks out in Wyoming hiking around and camping. And I was like, 'Sign me up! That's perfect! I don't even care what they're teaching. I don't know anything about geology!' Um, and I went, and one of the—one of the professors was a paleontologist, and I realized that everything that I liked about biology was even better when you added time to it. And so, yeah, I went back, I added geology as a second major, and I never—well, I wouldn't say I never looked back. I did take a couple years out in between undergrad and graduate school to make sure I didn't want to stay in kind of more conservation-oriented fields, so I worked in India for WWF and Project Tiger, working on tiger behavior and eco-tourism. But it was in this national park in India where there was these amazing Triassic outcrops, and so literally every single day, I was like driving around my jeep, like chasing tigers around to see what they were doing, and like looking up at the rocks like, 'What is in those rocks?' I just feel like if you're, like, spending it all day chasing tigers around and you're looking at the rocks instead, you should probably be a paleontologist!"

"And that's a good point! That's amazing! And like you're looking at the—there's tigers and you're looking at the rocks! But I guess that—that you found your true calling! But yeah, I love to hear stories about, you know, people who, who weren't necessarily wanting to be a paleontologist from the time they were a young kid, because, you know, I think that inspires people who maybe come to the interest later in life that there's definitely time! And people ask me the same thing, and I also didn't really know paleontology was a real thing until college; uh, you know, I didn't hear about it at a party but maybe, you know, somewhere else along the way! I didn't really probably go to—it wasn't invited to any parties, but you know, you know, it's great because it's something that you can come to at any point!

And just I wanted to ask Bullard, you mentioned it earlier; you know, part of what you're doing now as reimagining dinosaurs is that you're reimagining the way that we understand it culturally, and you're trying to bring back, um, dinosaurs to the Mongolian people that have been exported, um, you know, because as paleontology progressed in the early 20th century, we would, you know, in the United States and Europe, take fossils back home to us, and you're looking to change that with the Institute of Study of this Institute for the Study of Mongolian Dinosaurs. So I would just love to hear more about that and what you're up to with that these days and hopefully, the pandemic hasn't derailed you too much!"

"Yeah, well, um, what happened is basically, you know, for me, like, first time learning about the history of Mongolian paleontology was like through, um, being in a college in a geology major. Um, you know, history of like how big international expeditions, uh, been worked in Mongolia, you know, it started like a hundred years ago. Our first Mongolian dinosaur has been discovered by scientists from American Museum of Natural History. So that is basically, this, the history starts like in terms of scientific study, you know, happened in Mongolia. So all those fossils have been left the country, and so even now, it’s stored, uh, here in New York, AMNH. Um, so what happened is since then it was quite a big sensation when that big discovery happened, so those were like, you know, first Asian dinosaurs back then, you know, big, big, you know, discovery stuff! And since then, we had some number of expeditions from, uh, former, uh, socialist countries like Polish and Soviet expeditions worked and also collected a number of fossils; they all left the country. So what happens is all those fossils left the country and knowledge also leaves, so much public never been learned about this discovery. Um, so they even didn't know, even today as we speak, they just didn't know; they don't know even we can find dinosaurs in Mongolia! So that's kind of like what's shocking to me. I mean that really started when I came to the U.S. I'm looking back to my country from different, you know, angles, see, 'Oh gosh, this is what's happening in my country and all these fossils been left and this is amazing!' Look at these very nice museums all around the world, has amazing fossils being discovered! Look at all these kids and families and people come to learn about this interesting Earth history! And so then we have amazing fossils; how come we left so behind? So for me, was, you know, through the graduate school, I just keep thinking of this, that I really want to, you know, build a museum in Mongolia, not as big as AMNH, you know? I think we have big enough building that we can fill it up with all kinds of dinosaurs and other vertebrate fossils. We have a really good rich history of fossils. So right after I finish my graduate school and I really wanted to change this and establish the Institute for the Study of Mongolian Dinosaurs. So what we do, we basically reach out to communities, actually in the small towns; those towns right next to the fossil sites, and so we work with schools—they have, you know, small schools—and also community members and nomads, and so we really, you know, interact directly with them to give the knowledge of what they have in their backyard!

Um, so because they have, um, like I said, knowledge is left and so people, um, lack of knowledge, and also we had some economical difficulties in the early 90s, uh, people started selling dinosaur eggs in Mongolia to tourists, right? So this is that kind of wrap become bigger; it used to be a black market, now, what's happening is major auction houses, you know, openly public auctions happening that anybody, you know, can buy Mongolian fossils from auction houses. I mean that really bothered me, so we really think education is the solution! We really want to give the knowledge to the public, and, you know, people in Mongolia, they should learn about these, uh, issues and problems and exciting discoveries at the same time. So, um, and then, you know, I still haven't left—I mean, you know, forgotten of building the museum. I'm actually making quite progress of building the museum in the Gobi Desert, so I run, uh, basically an idea that we're going to launch, um, a paleontological program right out in the Gobi Desert and very close to the people who live there, close to the kids, you know, to make their dreams to come true, you know, if they want to become a paleontologist. So that's what we're focusing on now, so we're making a lot of good progress to build museums. So hopefully, in a few years, we have a museum right next to the fossil site. It's not just one museum we're talking about multiple museums that we're going to build because we have, you know, very important sites across the country that really needed protection and, you know, of those fossils sounds amazing! I want to—can I come visit when you're done?"

"Oh, yeah! No, anybody's welcome! We really want you all to come, you know, and see the museum and also, you know, you have all amazing knowledge and expertise that we needed, and also we have some knowledge we want to share with you, you know? So I think it's important that, you know, in terms of fossils, you know, happen to be finding in Mongolia, so we have responsibilities to protect, but fossils, you know, in general overall belong to everybody in the Earth because they have all rights to know about, you know, what happened back in the history. So I think for us is we just need to do, you know, what we can do and what we're supposed to do. So it means we protect the fossils, share the knowledge, and invite everybody. Yeah, Mongolia is one of the best! That's where I did my dissertation field work, and it's my favorite place in the world! I'm very happy to hear that! Yes, I miss it!"

"So actually, we have a couple more questions from the audience and one is from Michael Greshko himself! Um, he has a question for all three of you, or whoever would like to answer this first. So we talked about some new methods that you use to look at fossils. This is sort of a technical question: but with how should paleontologists approach excavation and preparation of these newfound fossils with all these new technologies in mind? So, you know, in the past, we may have been contaminating something that Yasmina would want or maybe, you know, not collecting the fossil appropriately that's good for 3D imaging or CT scanning or something like that! So, um, are there new things that paleontologists need to keep in mind when they're out in the field collecting specimens to make it useful for all these, you know, new advanced techniques that you all are using?"

"I mean, I guess I could start off with just a simple example. You know, I think I personally feel like we kind of prep fossils out of rock a lot less than we used to, you know? Certainly, when I was an undergraduate, um, you know, in the, in the, you know, mid 90s, um, you know, one of the first things that I did when I started getting into paleontology, it was working in the prep lab and, yeah, making sure every fossil was perfectly, um, perfectly prepared and, you know, there was no rock left, but now we kind of probably, you know, if we're not really sure what's in there, probably shove it into a CT scanner if it's the kind of right rock type and before we start hammering away at it, um, yeah, make sure you don't lose a lot of the little bones! So, yeah, I think like that's one thing that's probably changed, so we're probably not so keen to pick away at fossils before we actually know what's inside the rock. I don't know if that’s the rest of your experience."

"I would probably like agree with the same thing, and after that we've recently realized that there are lots of like really informative soft tissue residues preserved in all kinds of fossils, but literally all kinds of fossils! But often these molecular fossils are literally invisible to the naked eye, so you can have like the most amazing, you know, sort of like biological information recorded in your fossil, but you don't necessarily see it. It just looks like, you know, like a stain in the sediment matrix to you, and we just prepare it away, and there it is gone! I mean, I think you know, the key to this recent paper that we published on soft shell dinosaurs was really that very—quite often, especially molecular fossils, molecular residues—they are super thin, basically invisible! People just prepare it away! Like the reason that we figured out that these dinosaur eggs were soft-shelled was because, you know, people are slowly starting to consider that there may be things preserved that we can't necessarily see, um, not even under a microscope! And so without caution, we actually managed to find these, you know, soft residues of dinosaurs that you would not have seen at all! I mean, there is like a little bit of mineral precipitate on top, but, you know, anyone would have just prepared it away, and like the—the preparator at AMNH did like an incredible job not preparing that away! I don't know how, you know, how that was like originally realized, but I think it's just really fascinating! I think there's a lot of paleontological information and like biological information preserved in the fossil record in fossils that we have in our collections, um, and—and it's just waiting to be explored. So yeah! Don't over prepare your fossils; you never know what you're getting out of them!"

"Yeah, no, I think this is really an interesting point that, you know, especially now technology is amazing, you know, compared then. I mean, 10 years ago, I think it's impossible to do, you know, what are we doing right now? So, I think in probably, like, you know, thinking that, um, I mean digging, you know, going to expedition is a really cool thing, right? But now, because you know, a lot of technology can be portable, right? So you can bring the technology to the field! And then, you know, I mean, future probably we don't need to dig. We just leave it there, and we just bring all the technologies! And I think it's really, you know, for people, they really want to see, um, the fossils that is in the ground. I mean, that's more natural, and if you go to a museum in Old Mountain, beautifully nice, yes! And so people think, 'Oh, this is how you find it!' You know, I think that's hard to really think of, you know, how to imagine. So, um, yeah! For me, in the future, probably we will probably stop collecting, and so fossils would stay in the ground; people come to see. And, um, even you can do your research right in the ground, I mean, there's a lot of data people usually, you know, collect in situ without touching anything. I mean that could be, you know, another way could in a field could go. Um, and then at the same time, you know, the communities and people in the area, they have opportunity to see the fossils in there, you know, in the place and not to be traveling around. I mean, that's just one way could things happen, but of course, we want to show the fossils around the world! I mean there's a lot of traveling exhibits and things happening, so it's, you know, really a matter of the time! In a field can be a little different how we used to be; we used to do traditionally."

"Can I answer that? Actually, it just reminded me of something that one of the other things, along those lines of, you know, the thing like focusing on the fossils in the field—of course!—is I think we probably collect a lot more context about everything else that's around the fossils, too, to other organisms, get more of an idea of the ecology of the entire ecosystem as opposed to just focusing on, you know, one individual really cool fossil where we're, I think, bringing much more in from other fields! You know, obviously, you know, chemistry and things like that, but also really ecological principles! And, you know, it's not just about, 'Oh, is this a new species?' It's about, 'Well, how many specimens are there? What's their occurrence data? Things like that!' So I think bringing in a lot more of that information is, uh, far more important now than I think it was in the past."

"Yeah, we're a far cry from the days where paleontologists would just—if they saw a skull—just take that and just go, 'Okay!' and leave the rest of the— I mean, that used to actually happen! You just leave the post-cranials, everything behind the skull—just leave it in the ground and just take the head! And so we've moved very far, far beyond that, which is—which is a good thing for the field, for sure."

"And so there's another question from the group that was sort of about this topic that is a little, you know, just kind of like to back up a little bit, it's just how do we even know where to go look for fossils? And has that—I mean, has that changed at all? I know you know there’s probably some new ways that we use to identify potential dig sites and places to go look for fossils that aren't already in collections. I don't know who would—who's been into the field most recently, who would like to talk about that? I know Anjali goes in the field quite a bit; I was in the field in December."

"Yeah, recent, I suppose, right? Because you know where else? The last eight months?"

"Yeah, okay, that's—that’s recently as far as I'm concerned! So how did you know where to go?"

"Um, okay, so this is our field site in South India that we were at in December, and this is a field site that, um, you know, had been identified by, you know, British geologists back in, you know, the days when India was part of the British Empire. Um, and most of the field sites really, I think, around India, were kind of first noted by British geologists saying, 'Oh, there's some fossils here!' Um, but this site was especially noted for things like ammonites and lots of really, um, incredible marine invertebrates. Um, but a invertebrate paleontologist who'd been out there mentioned to me that he had seen some dinosaur bones and some ichthyosaur bones, um, and that it might be worth a look. And so it was about, oh, 12 or 13 years ago that we made a trip down there. I was like, um, my collaborator at the University of New Delhi; we went down and just scoured the area, and there was a lot of places where, um, you know, it was all marine invertebrates, which is cool, but, um, also, you know, new sites just full of sharks, which isn't normally what we're interested in, but you know there's tons of new species that hadn't been identified before! You know, there was a really nice light with dinosaurs and lots of other things. Um, yeah, and so that was just a matter of, in order to find our sites, we've kind of gone through the old geological literature from the geological surveys that happened, you know, a century ago, but also talking to people who weren't interested in these kinds of fossils but had gone out there looking for other things. So I think that's part of it, and that's especially important because, you know, there's certain parts of the world that are really well explored, um, and there's certain parts of the world that are really poorly explored. And in general, the Northern Hemisphere is far better explored in the Southern Hemisphere. So I really focus on, uh, you know, the Southern Hemisphere, and whenever I say those people say like, you know, that India is in the Northern Hemisphere and I do know that, but it was in my head at the Southern Hemisphere continent of course because it's like Gondwana continent! And so really trying to fill out the gaps and kind of the Gondwana record, especially for small things. So we have really great records of things like dinosaurs actually from the Southern Hemisphere, um, but we've done this project years ago trying to look at mammal distributions across the globe and realize that we have so little data from the Southern Hemisphere that we can do anything with any sort of statistical significance or confidence, and that really drove me saying, 'Okay, well, there's one little record from this area; let's go back and look very carefully there and just use all of our, you know, new techniques—just take a big team out, screen wash and look for the small stuff!' So it's really about going through and seeing where people may have mentioned something but never looked very carefully, just really trying to fill in the big gaps that still exist in the fossil record!"

"Right! Yeah, it's not as much, you know, sometimes the Jurassic Park Ground Penetrating Radar; it's a lot of still, I guess, that hasn't probably changed too much over the years. It's still looking at the old literature and knowing where people may have found something and just getting, you know, doing your investigative skills on the ground to see who's seen what where and trying to check those places out, and it's a good point! I guess maybe shifting more to thinking of new places to look or places that haven't been explored and, you know, at this point, even hundreds—even hundreds of years that may, you know, have some new fossils that can knock your socks off in, you know, in South India! That's—that’s really awesome!"

"So I know we only have about 10 minutes left in our chat today, so I just wanted to wrap up. Um, I have a couple questions, but let's see; I'll see if I can fit them both in. But this one could be good to end on in case we run out of time! Um, I know a lot of people hear about paleontology and go, 'I wish! I wish I could do that as a career!' and you can! So I think now, especially was as methods of analyzing fossils have changed and the field has changed, that there's new ways that people can get into paleontology and new roots. I mean, Yasmina mentioned doing chemistry as one way. Um, you know, some people in Michael's story mentioned they've never really taken many geology classes; they're fully biologists and, you know, developmental biologists even! So there's so many different backgrounds that people have in the field now! So I just wanted each one of you to recommend just ways that if a student or someone who wants to become a student is interested in being a paleontologist or learning more about the field of a student of any age, how—how might they go about that? And if you have any specific advice for women who are looking to enter the field of paleontology, can you, you know, splash that in since we all have experience with that? Um, I don't know if Yasmina, you would like to start?"

"Okay, yeah! I mean, maybe generally, like, you know, like if you are excited about like biology, if you're excited about life around you, if you're interested in what happened to life in the past or what is going to happen to life in the future, paleontology is probably your field! Um, I mean, I guess I would recommend everyone considering that paleontology nowadays is getting more and more integrated and interdisciplinary, I would really recommend to maybe take classes in sciences. You know, like, I mean you don't have to be like a geologist anymore to be like a really great paleontologist; like some of the most exciting discoveries are made by people who have a background in developmental biology, who have a background in, um, in computational analyses, you know, like stuff like that! So, you know, if you have any particular area or topic or a method of interest, you know, like that could be like the next game-changer in paleontology! So, um, yeah, I think that's—that's something worthy considering, you know, like take classes in sciences and—and just follow your excitement and your interests! And I mean, I guess then, you know, the key to making it through years and years of study programs is just, you know, be really excited and know that you want to do this, and then your motivation and excitement are just going to carry you through all that."

"Okay! What about you, Bullard? What do you tell people who say, 'I want to be just like you; I want to be a paleontologist like you?'"

"Well, I mean, it really depends; like if you are in the States, you have a lot of sources of information that you can go around. You know, even TV shows you can see! Nature shows, you know? And if you live close to even small museums that have fossils, that happen to have a paleontologist, I think real experience is really important, and you get a more realistic picture of the field! So I really encourage that if you’re close to museums or universities that have paleontologists—very first thing is to meet with paleontologists and—and so I think, I mean, I'm available if you want to ask questions! You know, I'll be happy to answer, you know, what you need and can direct you right way to, you know, the right person! But then if you know someone outside in, I mean, different countries, you know, and then story will be different! Like Mongolia. You know, I do have, you know, uh, students even young age in high school ask, you know, how I become a paleontologist; it's really a hard question for me because you don't have enough sources and very few paleontologists, and it's still very challenging to become a paleontologist. So then it comes down to the academic, you know, level. Yes, so I think, you know, all basic sciences would be really good to know, even, you know, knowing math, um, you know, biology, uh geology, I mean, nutrients, yeah, biology, geology, so you know, physics, and, you know, all these sciences! We use all those sciences to apply, you know, in paleontology! So I think most practical thing would be, you know, meet with someone if you can!

And now, you know, we have the internet, social media! If you want to meet someone like paleontologists, you can find them, and we can, you know, you can even Zoom, you know, anywhere from the world. You know, so probably language can be difficult, but then, you know, if you know a little English."

"Yeah! So, I think it's, you know, a lot of possibilities."

"Yes, that's—that's really good advice! Now it's kind of a good time to get people, because they're probably at home and not in the field, because a lot of times you email a paleontologist and say, 'Oh, I'm, you know, in Antarctica, Mongolia, China, wherever!' But now most people are home, so it's a good—it's a good time. And, yeah, I definitely echo that advice is like get some actual experience and see what it's actually like, because a lot of things sound fun on paper, and then if you maybe don't like the actual day-to-day of the work, um, you know, you can reconsider, but what you'd like to do! I don't know, Anjali, what do you think when students ask you these, or you have a new—you have a lot of students, so when someone approaches you and says I want to be a paleontologist?"

"Um, I think, yeah, I think one thing that a lot of people worry about is just that first kind of ask! But I think, I mean, there's probably very few times where somebody has emailed me and asked about wanting to, you know, maybe help out or volunteer or do a little research project where unless I'm just completely slammed or, um, you know, that I haven't responded or afforded onto somebody in my lab to say, 'Hey, if you're somebody who's interested, maybe, you know, give them some data and give them a, you know, a project that they could maybe work on or help out on,' I think it's always a really, really good idea to do that! I mean certainly, you know, when I started out, I—you know, just walked into a professor's office because it was before email was normal! So, you know, I just walked in and said like, 'Hey! I want to be a paleontologist!' and they're like, 'Okay, well read this paper and come back if you think it's interesting.' Um, I didn't know enough then to be like nervous about just doing that, and I think I would have known! Um, but I think you just email people! Email people are really happy to hear from people who might be interested in doing some research, you know? We've got way more to do than we could ever finish, and so we're always happy for somebody who wants to just come in and give us a give it a try and help out with the project! So I think definitely email people, you know? Like everybody said, you know, give it a try because research, you know, isn't necessarily for everyone, and some people love it, some people hate it! It's like Marmite, right? Um, on the—there's a flip side to that though, which is a lot of people don't think they can be a paleontologist because maybe they don't have the best grades or maybe they're not great at math, or maybe they're not great at, you know, biology or whatever. Um, I think equally you should not let that stop you because, you know, I would say I did not have the best grades as an undergraduate student, actually, but I was good at research, and you know, I did a solid job on my undergraduate project because I got really into it in a way just that I just don't get into coursework! Um, you know, I really just enjoy like the nitty-gritty of doing a research project. So, you know, don't let that stop you if you're—if you're really interested in doing research. Um, you know, reach out to somebody, drop in line, and also don't be afraid to send multiple emails! I never actually feel badgered if people send me two or three emails because sometimes I'm a little slow to respond! So do that, and be persistent and—and give it a try if you really want to, um, and don't let anybody dissuade you from giving it a try!"

"Yes, that was really good advice! I have joined the club of you need to email me probably multiple times if I don't respond instantly; you just then you have to email me again. So I think that's—that's good advice! Most of—most professors and researchers are very busy, um, so it’s good. Yeah! So that's all great advice, and I think it's a field that can accept people from a lot of backgrounds, like you said: math, chemistry, biology, physics, developmental biology. So all of these different fields are welcome, um, and so I think that's why it's so great and so interesting! And also, once you're a paleontologist, you can do a lot of other work that's not research like Bullard does, you know, doing these outreach and starting museums and non-profit work, and I'm a journalist, which is, you know, it's nice and I mean not specifically paleontology but just knowing about science helps you being a journalist! So if you know, there's lots of different directions that you can take your love of paleontology, if you have it!

So I think with only a couple minutes left, I won't ask another question because I'll probably go over time. Um, but hearing from everyone today was so inspiring, and you're all so amazing and role models of mine in my career and still continue to be incredible colleagues, and it's just so great that we could all get together today and do this and have everyone ask questions! So, yeah, if I guess we can part ways and some—Anjali can go to bed soon because she's in the UK, I can go eat lunch; we're gonna go have dinner! So thanks, everyone, for coming to this talk with these incredible women in paleontology for reimagining dinosaurs, and see you around!"