Simon Conway-Morris, a palaeontologist at Cambridge University, in England, is the champion of a new interpretation of evolution one that challenges the view that it is largely governed by the accident of circumstances.

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Giganotosaurus was, according to palaeontologist Dr. Jorge Calvo, a terrifying spectacle: a 10-ton meat-eater that was 46ft (14m) long, 23ft (7m) tall and three tons heavier than North America's bad boy Tyrannosaurus Rex.

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Derek Briggs, a palaeontologist at Yale University and an expert in exceptionally preserved fossils, praised the work, saying that the important step was elucidating the mechanism by which such fossils could be preserved.

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In July he pleased donors by appointing Richard Leakey, a former palaeontologist and head of Kenya's wildlife service, as head of the civil service, with promises of an anti-corruption shake-up in the ministries.

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But the University of Chicago palaeontologist argues in his paper that competitive sparring and self-defence were more likely roles for the fangs, based on a microscopic examination of teeth from Pegomastax and its kin.

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But the funeral so impressed Mr Leakey that when his own mother, Mary Leakey, a renowned palaeontologist, died 12 years later, Mr Leakey and his two brothers cremated her themselves in a similar fashion.

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Dr. Calvo is chief palaeontologist at Lago Barreales.

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Gould, a palaeontologist, observed that there are long periods of stasis in the fossil record, which is true, and inferred from this that selfish genery is therefore wrong because it predicts continual change, which is questionable.

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After Emily hit upon the fossil with a spade, her father and palaeontologist Dr Neville Hollingworth helped her dig out the block of mudstone the 162.8 million-year-old object, which had spikes to ward off predators, was encased in.

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