Steve Brusatte on the fall of dinosaurs and the rise of mammals
The Life Scientific
BBC
4.6 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 15 March 2022
⏱️ 41 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Steve Brusatte analyses the pace of evolutionary change and tries to answer big questions. Why did the dinosaurs die out and the mammals survive? How did dinosaurs evolve into birds? If you met a Velociraptor today you’d probably mistake it for a large flightless bird, says Steve. His intense interest in T. rex, Triceratops and all the other dinosaur species developed when he was a teenager and continues to this day. More recently, however, he’s focussed on the long history of mammals. For hundreds of millions of years, our mammalian ancestors remained small. Most were mouse-sized. None were bigger than a badger. Steve studies how, when an asteroid collided with earth 66 million years ago, the mammals got lucky. All the big dinosaurs were wiped out and only the small ones with wings survived. (Birds are dinosaurs, by the way). Within half a million years, mammals of all shapes and sizes had taken over on planet earth. Sabre-toothed flesh eaters, cow-sized plant guzzlers and a host of other warm blooded placental animals evolved alongside the badger sized burrowers.
Steve talks to Jim Al-Khalili about his life and work, including the recent discovery of an incredibly well-preserved Pterosaur on the Isle of Skye, a place he likes to call Scotland’s Jurassic Park. Producer: Anna Buckley
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, let me ask you, sir, have you heard George's podcast? |
| 0:06.1 | Me and Ben Brick are back with a blast, this time with stories from Africa's past. |
| 0:11.0 | Not too distant, unsolved mysteries, unsung heroes from untold histories, I'm trying |
| 0:16.9 | to make sense of the present day, join me on this journey by pressing play. |
| 0:23.9 | Have you heard George's podcast? |
| 0:25.7 | Chapter four. |
| 0:27.1 | Listen on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:31.6 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:35.2 | Hello and welcome to the Life Scientific, the show where I get to spend time with leading |
| 0:39.6 | scientists and you get to find out what gets them out of bed in the morning. |
| 0:44.0 | Today we'll be talking ancient reptiles, dinosaurs, crocodiles and terrors, and I'll |
| 0:50.1 | be finding out how mammals came to dominate our planet. |
| 0:54.6 | Steve Brissarty studies the pace of evolution, finding out how certain groups of species |
| 0:59.9 | take off on a role of evolutionary experimentation, while others grind to a halt and become extinct |
| 1:06.7 | or are suddenly wiped out. |
| 1:09.2 | Steve's interest in dinosaurs began in his teenage years, as did his writing career with contributions |
| 1:14.8 | to fossil news and other niche paleontological publications. |
| 1:19.8 | He's since shown how evolution makes a bird from a dinosaur. |
| 1:23.7 | Yes, that's right, birds are modern-day dinosaurs. |
| 1:27.1 | Recently, however, he spent more time thinking about mammals and how the worst day in the history |
| 1:32.3 | of our planet created a lucky break for our mouse-sized mammalian ancestors. |
| 1:37.9 | Steve Brissarty, Professor of Paleontology and Evolution at the University of Edinburgh, |
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