Holes in T. rex's skull now thought to have regulated body temperature

63 points by curtis 5 years ago | 24 comments
  • rland 5 years ago
    They studied alligators to arrive at their conclusion. It's pretty insane how long that group of animals have been on earth: the same basic design has been in play for 200 million years.

    Compare that to your typical piece of software ;)

    • zphds 5 years ago
      oooh, as a software engineer, too low... too low...

      In our defense we do not have hundreds of millions of years of test driven development. :P

      • doovd 5 years ago
        More like "let's just test in Prod"
        • tehlike 5 years ago
          That is life's way of doing it. Evolve, let natural selection take its course, rinse and repeat.
      • mrmonkeyman 5 years ago
        A lot of patterns and designs in software are about as old as the field is. Individual alligator don't get to live 200 million years.
        • nolok 5 years ago
          So you’re saying their brain works in COBOL ? Don’t fix what’s not broken and all that
        • kaushikt 5 years ago
          > "An alligator's body heat depends on its environment," said Kent Vliet, coordinator of laboratories at the University of Florida's Department of Biology. "Therefore, we noticed when it was cooler and the alligators are trying to warm up, our thermal imaging showed big hot spots in these holes in the roof of their skull, indicating a rise in temperature. Yet, later in the day when it's warmer, the holes appear dark, like they were turned off to keep cool.

          T.Rex seem to have similar holes filled with blood vessels.

          Fascinating.

          • jessaustin 5 years ago
            I think I understand what's being said, but taken literally it seems backwards? Body temperature probably was not regulated by dumping heat when the ambient temperature was cold. In those conditions heat should be conserved. Rather, heat is dumped (as much as possible) when the ambient temperature is warm.

            Also, alligators are not usually considered homeothermic.

            • im3w1l 5 years ago
              If I understand correctly, the alligator can choose to either pump blood to quickly equalize with the surrounding temperature, or not pump blood to get more isolation.

              In the morning when it wanted to heat up after the night it pumped blood. In the afternoon when it was already warm enough and the ambient temperature was too warm, it stopped pumping blood.

              • jessaustin 5 years ago
                Thanks, your way of stating it makes more sense to me. This sort of faculty would be used whenever the ambient temperature is closer to "optimal activity temperature" than the body is. Like you say, typically mid-morning when the environment has warmed up but the body hasn't. I suppose it could also work in the evening after a really hot day when it would be good to cool the body...
            • homero 5 years ago
              Sounds like a heatsink
            • algaeontoast 5 years ago
              I love science and history, but there are times when I have to wonder why knowing what holes in a T Rex skull were for really benefits or forwards society?

              I'm posting this because I'd like to be proven wrong.

              • blacksmith_tb 5 years ago
                Obviously lots of science doesn't have practical applications (astrophysics anyone?) but I am skeptical "does X benefit society?" applies any better to much (maybe most) of what people actually do. I might turn it around and say that (nearly) all of what humans do doesn't benefit our societies, so much as it doesn't destroy them.
                • algaeontoast 5 years ago
                  I agree, however, with so many pressing issues today I'd be a bit uneasy if tax payer dollars were being used for this kind of research. Private funding, do what you like, however federal grants should be used for research that benefits taxpayers in some way, even if it's indirect or decades away.
            • ChristianGeek 5 years ago
              I wish I had an air conditioner in my head right now.
              • throwaway_law 5 years ago
                You do, 7-10% of your body heat escapes through your head (although most claim its 50%), but your ears, nose and cheeks also contain special blood vessels to assist with cooling the body.
                • ubertakter 5 years ago
                  The 50% claim probably comes from the fact that heat loss through your head has a greater affect on core body temperature than other exposed areas. In [1], they did some submersion tests with head in or out for both insulated and exposed bodies (test subjects). Head-in accounted for a fairly large increase in core body temperature loss (39-45% depending on the configuration). While this study was in water, it seems reasonable to expect the same thing in air, in particular since you tend to spend longer in the cold outside than you might in water.

                  Edited to add this effect is likely due to the amount of blood flow to the brain and the short path (relatively) between the brain and the heart.

                  [1] https://www.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.012...

              • ncmncm 5 years ago
                "Air conditioner". Reading, it's blood vessels. So, really, a radiator. Nothing to do with cooling air, and everything to do with transferring heat from blood to air, resulting in warmer air and cooler blood.

                Bad, journalism. No biscuit.

                • vectorEQ 5 years ago
                  global warming caused newly discovered by T-rex cranial radiators
                • majestik 5 years ago
                  Gotta keep a cool head, T.