How to Identify Fossilized Bones | Bone Hunt: Discovering Dinosaurs with AI | Intel Software

[@samchesebrough3573]

Fascinating info! Can’t wait to fuel more adventures with paleontology and AI knowledge!

[@zmadscientist]

Thanks Sam! I'm laying the underpinnings of the paleo field work first as this informs why the AI model even has a chance

[@horseman-tq1uq]

you didn't explain the difference between calcified bone and fossilized bone. there are people going around claiming the bone you found is calcified not fossilized.

[@zmadscientist]

Good point - these bones are all found primarily in Brushy Basin member of the Morrison - geologists date this to 145 MYA = fossil. I do believe that some fossils may have started w calcification, and then a secondary replacement w silica. We have found example of a known allosaurus find (hand claw gives it away) where the limb bones (split down the middle) show a calcite core in what used to be hollow bone surrounded by silica dominated chert/agatize bone

[@horseman-tq1uq]

@@zmadscientist thank you for reply, up until this point I thought calcification of bone is due to some health condition in living tissue. I also understand what you are saying, but if the entire bone started by getting calcified, one would have to explain why only part of it had enough time to be replaced and not the rest of it. I don't know anything biodegradable that can escape the factor of time, even if it is the middle of the bone. I'm also considering possibility that a type of bone or specific part of it may take longer to completely fossilize. Has the allosaurus age been determined?, I'm curious.

[@ryansmith8782]

I found a rock that I think is a quartz bone. It looks like a bone but it also looks like quartz or Smokey quartz maybe. It has no typical characteristics of bone except it’s size and shape. I found in central nm.