Predentaries: A Poem

So it’s Poetry Day, and I was reminded of this terrible poem I wrote while I was writing my dissertation:   Predentaries A poem by Ali Nabavizadeh The predentary bone is one to ponder; Unique, peculiar, and full of wonder. It sat in front of many a dinosaur jaw; In hopes that plants are what…

“Propaliny” is not a thing. (It’s either “proal” or “palinal” — Choose wisely.)

There’s something I need to get off my chest. It’s been bugging me for about a year now ever since a good friend and colleague of mine, Dr. Julia Schultz, pointed it out to me while we were both postdocs at the University of Chicago and my mind kind of imploded. “Propalinal” jaw movement is…

Dinosaurs with Marionette Jaws: The Case for the Predentary in Ornithischians

As I mentioned in a previous post, ornithischian dinosaurs are enormously diverse. From the horned ceratopsians and dome-headed pachycephalosaurs to the armored stegosaurs and ankylosaurs and duck-billed hadrosaurs (and others), they make up a majority of the herbivorous non-avian dinosaur taxa to have ever lived. It’s a well-known fact that the presence of a single…

Benevolence in Science: Dr. Jack Conrad’s Legacy in Paleontology

Many of us anatomists and paleontologists were completely and utterly shocked to learn that we lost a dear friend and colleague a few days ago, Dr. Jack Conrad. And, although I didn’t get to know him nearly as well as I wish I could have, it is so incredibly clear how much of a positive…

Jaw Mechanics in Ornithischian Dinosaurs

Ornithischia is a large and incredibly diverse clade including a majority of the megaherbivorous dinosaur subclades, except sauropodomorphs and few non-avian theropods. It included the horned ceratopsian dinosaurs, like Triceratops, the dome-headed pachycephalosaurs, the armored dinosaurs, like Ankylosaurus, the plated and spiked dinosaurs, like Stegosaurus, and the duck-billed hadrosaurs and their relatives. For well over a century, researchers have explored…

“The Elephant’s Head” – Boas and Paulli Monograph

There is so much to say regarding the true beauty of the anatomy of living things and that is a large part of what this blog is meant for. I thought I might start off by showing some illustrations from my all-time favorite animal  anatomy monograph. This is Boas and Paulli’s “The Elephant’s Head”,  published in…

Hadrosaur Jaw Mechanics!

For my first research post, I’ve decided to repost (from my previous blog) a description of my first paper. Here it is! —– Hadrosaurs (a.k.a., the ‘duck-billed dinosaurs’) never really get the attention they deserve. Why? Well, probably because they don’t really have much in the way of cool spikes, armor, horns, or knife-like, serrated teeth…

A Little Introduction

Hey everyone! My name is Ali Nabavizadeh and I’m a postdoctoral scholar in Organismal Biology and Anatomy at the University of Chicago teaching medical gross anatomy and the Pritzker School of Medicine. I received my PhD in Functional Anatomy and Evolution at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 2014. I am interested in…