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We've all heard about
how the dinosaurs died.
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The story I'm going to tell you
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happened over 200 million years
before the dinosaurs went extinct.
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This story starts at the very beginning,
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when dinosaurs were just
getting their start.
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One of the biggest mysteries
in evolutionary biology
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is why dinosaurs were so successful.
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What led to their global dominance
for so many years?
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When people think about
why dinosaurs were so amazing,
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they usually think about the biggest
or the smallest dinosaur,
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or who was the fastest,
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or who had the most feathers,
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the most ridiculous armor,
spikes or teeth.
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But perhaps the answer had to do
with their internal anatomy,
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a secret weapon, so to speak.
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My colleagues and I,
we think it was their lungs.
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I am both a paleontologist
and a comparative anatomist,
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and I am interested in understanding
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how the specialized dinosaur lung
helped them take over the planet.
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So we are going to jump back
over 200 million years
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to the Triassic Period.
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The environment was extremely harsh,
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there were no flowering plants,
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so this means that there was no grass.
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So imagine a landscape
filled with all pine trees and ferns.
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At the same time,
there were small lizards,
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mammals, insects,
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and there were also carnivorous
and herbivorous reptiles,
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all competing for the same resources.
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Critical to this story
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is that oxygen levels
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have been estimated to have been
as low as 15 percent,
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compared to today's 21 percent.
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So it would have been crucial
for dinosaurs to be able to breathe
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in this low-oxygen environment,
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not only to survive
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but to thrive and to diversify.
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So, how do we know
what dinosaur lungs were even like,
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since all that remains of a dinosaur
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generally is its fossilized skeleton?
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So the method that we use
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is called extant phylogenetic bracketing.
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This is a fancy way of saying
that we study the anatomy,
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specifically in this case
the lungs and skeleton,
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of the living descendants of dinosaurs
on the evolutionary tree.
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So we would look at the anatomy of birds,
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who are the direct
descendants of dinosaurs,
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and we'd look at
the anatomy of crocodilians,
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who are their closest living relatives,
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and then we would look at
the anatomy of lizards and turtles,
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who we can think of like their cousins.
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And then we apply these anatomical data
to the fossil record,
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and then we can use that
to reconstruct the lungs of dinosaurs.
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And in this specific instance,
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the skeleton of dinosaurs
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most closely resembles
that of modern birds.
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So, because dinosaurs were competing with
early mammals during this time period,
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it's important to understand
the basic blueprint of the mammalian lung.
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Also, to reintroduce you
to lungs in general,
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we will use my dog Mila of Troy,
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the face that launched a thousand treats,
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as our model.
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(Laughter)
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So this story takes place
inside of a chest cavity.
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So I want you to visualize
the ribcage of a dog.
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Think about how the spine
and vertebral column
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is completely horizontal to the ground.
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This is how the spinal vertebral column
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is going to be in all of the animals
that we will be talking about,
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whether they walked on two legs
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or four legs.
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Now, I want you to climb inside
of the imaginary ribcage and look up.
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This is our thoracic ceiling.
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This is where the top surface of the lungs
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comes into direct contact
with the ribs and vertebrae.
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This interface is where
our story takes place.
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Now I want you to visualize
the lungs of a dog.
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On the outside, it's like
a giant inflatable bag
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where all parts of the bag
expand during inhalation
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and contract during exhalation.
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Inside of the bag, there's a series
of branching tubes,
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and these tubes are called
the bronchial tree.
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These tubes deliver the inhaled oxygen
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to, ultimately, the alveoli.
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They cross over a thin membrane
into the bloodstream by diffusion.
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Now, this part is critical.
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The entire mammalian lung is mobile.
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That means it's moving
during the entire respiratory process,
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so that thin membrane,
the blood-gas barrier,
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cannot be too thin or it will break.
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Now, remember the blood-gas barrier,
because we will be returning to thsi.
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So, you're still with me?
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Because we're going to start birds
and it gets crazy,
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so hold on to your butts.
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So the bird
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is completely different from the mammal,
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and we are going to be using birds
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as our model to reconstruct
the lungs of dinosaurs.
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So in the bird,
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air passes through the lung,
but the lung does not expand or contract.
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The lung is immobilized,
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it has the texture of a dense sponge,
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and it's inflexible
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and locked into place on the top
and sides by the ribcage
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and on the bottom
by a horizontal membrane.
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It is then unidirectionally ventilated
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by a series of flexible,
bag-like structures
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that branch off of the bronchial tree
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beyond the lung itself,
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and these are called air sacs.
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Now, this entire extremely delicate setup
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is locked into place
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by a series of forked ribs
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all along the thoracic ceiling.
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Also, in many species of birds,
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extension arise from the lung
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and the air sacs,
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they invade the skeletal tissues,
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usually the vertebrae, sometimes the ribs,
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and they lock the respiratory
system into place,
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and this is called vertebral pneumaticity.
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The forked ribs and
the vertebral pneumaticity
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are two clues that we can hunt for
in the fossil record,
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because these two skeletal traits
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would indicate that regions
of the respiratory system of dinosaurs
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are immobilized.
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This anchoring of the respiratory system
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facilitated the evolution
of the thinning of the blood-gas barrier,
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that thin membrane over which oxygen
was diffusing into the bloodstream.
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The immobility permits this
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because a thin barrier is a weak barrier,
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and the weak barrier would rupture
if it was actively being ventilated
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like a mammalian lung.
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So why do we care about this?
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Why does this even matter?
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Oxygen more easily diffuses
across a thin membrane,
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and a thin membrane is one way
of enhancing respiration
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under low-oxygen conditions,
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low-oxygen conditions
like that of the Triassic Period.
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So, if dinosaurs did indeed
have this type of lung,
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they'd be better equipped to breathe
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than all other animals,
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including mammals.
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So do you remember the extant
phylogenetic bracket method,
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where we take the anatomy
of modern animals
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and we apply that to the fossil record?
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So, clue number one
was the forked ribs of modern birds.
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Well, we find that in pretty much
the majority of dinosaurs.
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So that means that the top surface
of the lungs of dinosaurs
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would be locked into place,
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just like modern birds.
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Clue number two is vertebral pneumaticity.
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We find this in sauropod dinosaurs
and theropod dinosaurs,
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which is the group that contains
predatory dinosaurs
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and gave rise to modern birds.
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And while we don't find evidence
of fossilized lung tissue in dinosaurs,
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vertebral pneumaticity gives us evidence
of what the lung was doing
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during the life of these animals.
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Lung tissue or air sac tissue
was invading the vertebrae,
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hollowing them out
just like a modern bird,
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and locking regions
of the respiratory system into place,
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immobilizing them.
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The forked ribs
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and the vertebral pneumaticity together
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were creating an immobilized,
rigid framework
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that locked the respiratory
system into place
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that permitted the evolution
of that super-thin,
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super-delicate blood-gas barrier
that we see today in modern birds.
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Evidence of this straight-jacketed
lung in dinosaurs
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means that they had
the capability to evolve a lung
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that would have been able to breathe
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under the hypoxic, or low-oxygen
atmosphere of the Triassic period.