Science & Cocktails Johannesburg Date: 29 November 2016 Speaker: Jonah Choiniere (University of the Witwatersrand) Size matters! Giant dinosaurs and their African origins What is the largest terrestrial animal of all time? Why aren’t there bigger land-dwelling mammals today? What does the South African fossil record have to say about the evolution of giant dinosaurs? How do we estimate the mass of extinct animals? And... could dinosaur farts have contributed to global warming? Sauropod dinosaurs were the biggest terrestrial animals of all time, nearly equaling the body mass of the largest whales today. How did they function at such large body sizes? And how did they evolve from small, two legged dinosaurs that roamed the Earth more than 200 million years ago? In this episode of Science & Cocktails Johannesburg, Jonah Choiniere will answer those questions, and will discuss the role that South Africa plays in understanding sauropod evolution. Finally, he will give us a “sneak peek” at the largest dinosaur ever recovered from the Karoo. Hint: it’s a lot bigger than an elephant. http://www.scienceandcocktails.org/jozi https://www.facebook.com/scienceandcocktailsjozi @SciCocktailsJHB