Alamosaurus is one of the few titanosaurs known to have lived in late Cretaceous North America, and possibly in vast numbers: According to one analysis, there may have been 350,000 of these 50-foot-long herbivores roaming through Texas at any given time. Its closest relative appears to have been another titanosaur, Saltasaurus.

By the way, Alamosaurus wasn't named after the Alamo in Texas, but the Ojo Alamo sandstone formation in New Mexico. This dinosaur already had its name when numerous (but incomplete) fossils were discovered in the Lone Star State, so you might say that everything worked out in the end!

Read more about dinosaurs like Alamosaurus: Titanosaurs - The Last of the Sauropods

Illustration: Wikimedia Commons

Paleontologists have never quite been sure what to make of Archaeopteryx: this pigeon-sized creature, which lived about 145 million years ago, is often considered to be the first true bird, even though its tail and teeth were distinctly reptilian. Now, a new study has shown that Archaeopteryx's hearing was on the lower end of the bird spectrum, comparable to that of a modern emu.

How can anyone infer the hearing ability of an animal that lived during the late Jurassic period? Well, researchers subjected the fossilized inner ear of Archaeopteryx to computerized tomography (CT) scans, and compared the results to modern birds. Although emus aren't known for their sharp hearing, the fact that Archaeopteryx attained even this level of auditory prowess is further evidence that it was more on the bird than on the reptile end of the evolutionary spectrum.

Afrovenator is an important dinosaur for two reasons: first, it's one of the few nearly complete theropods to be unearthed in northern Africa, and second, it appears to have been closely related to the North American Megalosaurus--yet more evidence for the close proximity of these continents during the early Cretaceous period.

This bipedal carnivore has also become something of a calling card for the noted paleontologist Paul Sereno, who discovered it in the early 1990's and carted its bones back to his home base at the University of Chicago, where it's currently stored.

Illustration: Wikimedia Commons

You have to feel sorry for Texans these days: not only are they losing their beloved president, but their official State Dinosaur is having an identity crisis. According to the University of Minnesota's Peter Rose (who obtained his undergraduate degree in geology at SMU), the current Texas state dinosaur, Pleurocoelus, has been misidentified. The bones of this sauropod were first unearthed in Maryland in the late 19th century, and similar fossil remains found in Texas were assigned to this genus. Not so fast, Rose says: the Texas bones are different enough to merit their own genus, Paluxysaurus (after the Paluxy River near Glen Rose, Texas).

Whatever the case--a resolution to change the name has been filed with the Texas legislature--Texans must be disappointed that their state sauropod is so obscure. The fact is, all the big dinosaur finds have been made to the north and west of the Lone Star State, in places like Nebraska and Arizona, and I somehow doubt that Paluxysaurus (or Pleurocoelus) will ever roll off kids' tongues as naturally as Brachiosaurus or Apatosaurus.