Being a dinosaur has always had its drawbacks. The most prominent being early extinction, of course. And now here's this one about dying prematurely due to sex among all things!
As US and Canadian researchers have published it in Science, under the cryptic title of "Tyrannosaur Life Tables: An Example of Nonavian Dinosaur Population Biology", tyrannosaurs had trouble coping with midlife crisis. With their overaggressive lifestyle (rivalry for mates, constant abuse of lesser species, and the mandatory abuse socially aware father T-Rexes had to expose their child dinos to), excessive eating, and the occasional over-fasting while nesting all are among the causes of an increase in the mortality rate among those tyrannosaurs that enter the age of sexual maturity. So, when life finally becomes really interesting, you die.
"For tyrannosaurs - love was a dangerous game" states Gregory Erickson, "death awaited those entering the breeding population".
My contribution to today's science will be an extension of Erickson's statement: Love is a dangerous game. Period. No exception to this rule, no matter how idealized a view one holds about love. It sure bears a great deal of danger for all "those entering the breeding population". Just think about the black widow spider or the praying mantis from the animal kingdom. We have examples in great abundance among humans as well: Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII, Helen of Troy and Brad Pitt, or the Adam-Serpent-Eve triangle, for that matter.
For a summary of the article, go to:
http://bio.fsu.edu/~gerick/sciencemag/
Full article can be accessed at:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/313/5784/213
As US and Canadian researchers have published it in Science, under the cryptic title of "Tyrannosaur Life Tables: An Example of Nonavian Dinosaur Population Biology", tyrannosaurs had trouble coping with midlife crisis. With their overaggressive lifestyle (rivalry for mates, constant abuse of lesser species, and the mandatory abuse socially aware father T-Rexes had to expose their child dinos to), excessive eating, and the occasional over-fasting while nesting all are among the causes of an increase in the mortality rate among those tyrannosaurs that enter the age of sexual maturity. So, when life finally becomes really interesting, you die.
"For tyrannosaurs - love was a dangerous game" states Gregory Erickson, "death awaited those entering the breeding population".
My contribution to today's science will be an extension of Erickson's statement: Love is a dangerous game. Period. No exception to this rule, no matter how idealized a view one holds about love. It sure bears a great deal of danger for all "those entering the breeding population". Just think about the black widow spider or the praying mantis from the animal kingdom. We have examples in great abundance among humans as well: Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII, Helen of Troy and Brad Pitt, or the Adam-Serpent-Eve triangle, for that matter.
For a summary of the article, go to:
http://bio.fsu.edu/~gerick/sciencemag/
Full article can be accessed at:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/313/5784/213
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