Brendan Clark
Degree Held:
B.Sc., Earth Sciences - Paleontology Option, Montana State University, Spring 2024
Degree Sought:
M.S., Earth Sciences
Advisor:
Dr. David Varricchio
Research Project:
Anatomical description and phylogeny of a small fossil turtle from Montana's Blackleaf Formation (~100 Ma).
The main components of Brendan’s thesis work come in two chapters. The first being an anatomical description of a new, unusually small turtle fossil from 100-million-year-old deposits from southwest Montana. This includes CT scanning and a digital reconstruction of the specimen to inform the description and analysis of the turtle’s evolutionary relationships with known species. The second chapter is targeted toward interpreting umbilical scars on juvenile fossil turtles, a structure derived from where the yolk sac attaches to the shell of a hatchling turtle. This study aims to determine the variability of umbilical scar size and closure across several modern turtle species to inform interpretations of this fossil specimen.
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