Our Upcoming Speaker
Note: Meetings are Hybrid with Zoom and In-Person at the Lodge at the Birmingham Zoo
MONDAY OCTOBER 5, 2026 at 7:00 PM Central Time USA
Title: "The last American giant: the sauropod Alamosaurus and the end of the Age of Dinosaurs"
Speaker: John Fronimos, Senior Lecturer, Department of Geosciences, Auburn University
Abstract:
The Mesozoic era is known for its dinosaur giants, and none were larger than the long-necked sauropods. Debate has persisted for years as to whether the extinction of the sauropods was a long, slow decline or the sudden destruction of a group that thrived until their final moments. The North American contribution to this question has been limited by the scarcity of well-preserved sauropod fossils from the latest Cretaceous. Now, previously undescribed specimens of titanosaur sauropods from western Texas offer new insights into the end of the age of American giants. How late did these animals survive? Were they one species or several? And, in the end, were they the last gasp of a doomed lineage or the leading edge of an expanding radiation that was cut down in its prime?
About the Speaker:
John Fronimos is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Geosciences at Auburn University, with over a decade of teaching experience in paleontology, micropaleontology, Earth history, sedimentology and stratigraphy, and field geology. His research interests include the evolution and extinction of sauropod dinosaurs, especially Cretaceous titanosaurs, as well as how the structure and function of the vertebral column enabled their giant sizes. This work has taken him to Big Bend National Park in west Texas for fieldwork and to museums across the US, Europe, and South America. John holds a BS from the University of Texas at San Antonio, an MS from Texas Tech University, and a PhD from the University of Michigan.