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67-553: Acanthopholididae Nopcsa , 1902 Acanthopholidae Nopcsa, 1917 ? Hylaeosauridae Nopcsa, 1902 Palaeoscincidae Nopcsa, 1918 Panoplosauridae Nopcsa, 1929 Struthiosauridae Kuhn, 1966 Nodosauridae is a family of ankylosaurian dinosaurs known from the Late Jurassic to the Late Cretaceous periods in what is now Asia, Europe, North America, and possibly South America. While traditionally regarded as

134-787: A monophyletic clade as the sister taxon to the Ankylosauridae , some analyses recover it as a paraphyletic grade leading to the ankylosaurids. Nodosaurids, like their sister group the ankylosaurids, were heavily armored dinosaurs adorned with rows of bony armor nodules and spines ( osteoderms ), which were covered in keratin sheaths. Nodosaurids, like other ankylosaurians, were small- to large-sized, heavily built, quadrupedal , herbivorous dinosaurs , possessing small, leaf-shaped teeth. Unlike ankylosaurids, nodosaurids lacked mace-like tail clubs, instead having more flexible tail tips. Many nodosaurids had spikes projecting outward from their shoulders. One particularly well-preserved nodosaurid "mummy",

201-728: A bacterial genome over three types of outbreak contact networks—homogeneous, super-spreading, and chain-like. They summarized the resulting phylogenies with five metrics describing tree shape. Figures 2 and 3 illustrate the distributions of these metrics across the three types of outbreaks, revealing clear differences in tree topology depending on the underlying host contact network. Super-spreader networks give rise to phylogenies with higher Colless imbalance, longer ladder patterns, lower Δw, and deeper trees than those from homogeneous contact networks. Trees from chain-like networks are less variable, deeper, more imbalanced, and narrower than those from other networks. Scatter plots can be used to visualize

268-544: A definition followed by Vickaryous, Teresa Maryańska , and Weishampel in 2004. Vickaryous et al. considered two genera of nodosaurids to be of uncertain placement ( incertae sedis ): Struthiosaurus and Animantarx , and considered the most primitive member of the Nodosauridae to be Cedarpelta . Following the publication of the PhyloCode , Nodosauridae needed to be formally defined following certain parameters, including that

335-499: A disproof of a previously widely accepted theory. During the late 19th century, Ernst Haeckel 's recapitulation theory , or "biogenetic fundamental law", was widely popular. It was often expressed as " ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny", i.e. the development of a single organism during its lifetime, from germ to adult, successively mirrors the adult stages of successive ancestors of the species to which it belongs. But this theory has long been rejected. Instead, ontogeny evolves  –

402-536: A language as an evolutionary system. The evolution of human language closely corresponds with human's biological evolution which allows phylogenetic methods to be applied. The concept of a "tree" serves as an efficient way to represent relationships between languages and language splits. It also serves as a way of testing hypotheses about the connections and ages of language families. For example, relationships among languages can be shown by using cognates as characters. The phylogenetic tree of Indo-European languages shows

469-518: A motorcycle journey together with his long-standing Albanian secretary and lover Bajazid Elmaz Doda to study fossils . He later returned to Vienna where he ran into financial difficulties again and was distracted in his work. To cover his debts, he sold his fossil collection to the Natural History Museum in London. Nopcsa struggled with illness, to the extent that he had to give a lecture in

536-417: A phylogenetic tree can be living taxa or fossils , which represent the present time or "end" of an evolutionary lineage, respectively. A phylogenetic diagram can be rooted or unrooted. A rooted tree diagram indicates the hypothetical common ancestor of the tree. An unrooted tree diagram (a network) makes no assumption about the ancestral line, and does not show the origin or "root" of the taxa in question or

603-423: A reigning European monarch, I would have no difficulty coming up with the further funds needed by marrying a wealthy American heiress aspiring to royalty, a step which under other circumstances I would have been loath to take.' During his lifetime Nopcsa wrote a memoir based on diaries and notes from 1897 to 1917. Even though he finished the memoir around 1929, it was never published during his lifetime. Only in 2001

670-693: A shared evolutionary history. There are debates if increasing the number of taxa sampled improves phylogenetic accuracy more than increasing the number of genes sampled per taxon. Differences in each method's sampling impact the number of nucleotide sites utilized in a sequence alignment, which may contribute to disagreements. For example, phylogenetic trees constructed utilizing a more significant number of total nucleotides are generally more accurate, as supported by phylogenetic trees' bootstrapping replicability from random sampling. The graphic presented in Taxon Sampling, Bioinformatics, and Phylogenomics , compares

737-462: A significant source of error within phylogenetic analysis occurs due to inadequate taxon samples. Accuracy may be improved by increasing the number of genetic samples within its monophyletic group. Conversely, increasing sampling from outgroups extraneous to the target stratified population may decrease accuracy. Long branch attraction is an attributed theory for this occurrence, where nonrelated branches are incorrectly classified together, insinuating

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804-631: A single tree with true claim. The same process can be applied to texts and manuscripts. In Paleography , the study of historical writings and manuscripts, texts were replicated by scribes who copied from their source and alterations - i.e., 'mutations' - occurred when the scribe did not precisely copy the source. Phylogenetics has been applied to archaeological artefacts such as the early hominin hand-axes, late Palaeolithic figurines, Neolithic stone arrowheads, Bronze Age ceramics, and historical-period houses. Bayesian methods have also been employed by archaeologists in an attempt to quantify uncertainty in

871-594: A small group of taxa to represent the evolutionary history of its broader population. This process is also known as stratified sampling or clade-based sampling. The practice occurs given limited resources to compare and analyze every species within a target population. Based on the representative group selected, the construction and accuracy of phylogenetic trees vary, which impacts derived phylogenetic inferences. Unavailable datasets, such as an organism's incomplete DNA and protein amino acid sequences in genomic databases, directly restrict taxonomic sampling. Consequently,

938-592: A species to uncover either a higher abundance of important bioactive compounds (e.g., species of Taxus for taxol) or natural variants of known pharmaceuticals (e.g., species of Catharanthus for different forms of vincristine or vinblastine). Phylogenetic analysis has also been applied to biodiversity studies within the fungi family. Phylogenetic analysis helps understand the evolutionary history of various groups of organisms, identify relationships between different species, and predict future evolutionary changes. Emerging imagery systems and new analysis techniques allow for

1005-566: A theory about the dinosaurs' sexual dimorphism , which he published in 1926. Among others, he thought that hadrosaurid species with the cranial crests were males and those without them were females. He paired Kritosaurus with Parasaurolophus , Prosaurolophus with Saurolophus and others. His examples were not proved to be true, but his opinion that sexual dimorphism was present among hadrosaurid dinosaurs has gained acceptance, see for example Lambeosaurus . Nopcsa discovered and named several species in his lifetime. In 1899 he named

1072-656: A wheelchair in 1928. Soon Nopcsa became depressed. Finally, in 1933, he fatally shot first his partner, Bayazid Elmas Doda, after having slipped sleeping powder into his tea. He then wrote a suicide note, where he states the reason for his actions a nervous breakdown, and shot himself. He was cremated at Feuerhalle Simmering in Vienna, and his ashes buried there (Section 3, Ring 3, Group 8, No. 44). In his suicide note, he describes his reasons for killing his partner: The reason that I shot my longtime friend and secretary, Mr Bayazid Elmas Doda, in his sleep without his suspecting at all

1139-550: Is "tree shape." These approaches, while computationally intensive, have the potential to provide valuable insights into pathogen transmission dynamics. The structure of the host contact network significantly impacts the dynamics of outbreaks, and management strategies rely on understanding these transmission patterns. Pathogen genomes spreading through different contact network structures, such as chains, homogeneous networks, or networks with super-spreaders, accumulate mutations in distinct patterns, resulting in noticeable differences in

1206-621: Is defined in the PhyloCode as "the largest clade containing Panoplosaurus mirus , but not Nodosaurus textilis and Struthiosaurus austriacus " while Struthiosaurini has a similar definition of "the largest clade containing Struthiosaurus austriacus , but not Nodosaurus textilis and Panoplosaurus mirus ". Topology A below demonstrates these relationships, following the phylogenetic analyses of Rivera-Sylva and colleagues (2018), with clade names added by definition from Madzia et al. (2021). However, in 2023, Raven and colleagues proposed an alternate phylogeny for nodosaurids; instead of

1273-401: Is now shared by much of the scientific community. Nopcsa studied Transylvanian dinosaurs intensively, even though they were smaller than their "cousins" elsewhere in the world. For example, he unearthed six-meter-long sauropods , a group of dinosaurs which elsewhere commonly grew to 30 meters or more, which he named Magyarosaurus . Nopcsa deduced that the area where the remains were found

1340-573: Is that I did not wish to leave him behind sick, in misery and without a penny, because he would have suffered too much. Nopcsa left behind a considerable quantity of scientific publications and private diaries. The diaries paint a picture of a complex man with great intuition, but without the ability to understand the motives of others. His devotion to the cause of the Albanians was in contrast to his sociopathic insensitivity. In his diaries he nonchalantly wrote about his bid to become king of Albania : Once

1407-437: Is the identification, naming, and classification of organisms. Compared to systemization, classification emphasizes whether a species has characteristics of a taxonomic group. The Linnaean classification system developed in the 1700s by Carolus Linnaeus is the foundation for modern classification methods. Linnaean classification relies on an organism's phenotype or physical characteristics to group and organize species. With

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1474-444: Is the study of the evolutionary history of life using genetics, which is known as phylogenetic inference . It establishes the relationship between organisms with the empirical data and observed heritable traits of DNA sequences, protein amino acid sequences, and morphology . The results are a phylogenetic tree —a diagram setting the hypothetical relationships between organisms and their evolutionary history. The tips of

1541-525: The First World War , Nopcsa was on another mission as a spy for Austria-Hungary , working undercover as a shepherd in Transylvania. He also led a group of Albanian wartime volunteers. Nopcsa was the first to hijack  an aircraft. His motive for aircraft hijacking was to flee the nascent and ultimately short-lived Hungarian Soviet Republic in 1919 to Vienna. With the defeat of Austria-Hungary at

1608-465: The Turks . However, afterwards the newly liberated states immediately plunged into internal conflicts. During these Balkan Wars, Nopcsa spied for Austria-Hungary . Out of these conflicts, Albania arose as an independent state, which needed a king. Nopcsa volunteered, suggesting he would use money he would gain from marrying a rich American girl to fund the war efforts, however, to no avail. Later, during

1675-420: The physiology and living behavior of the dinosaurs he was studying. Nopcsa was the first to suggest that these archosaurs cared for their young and exhibited complex social behavior, an idea that did not take off until the 1980s. Because he was one of the first people to study the biology of dinosaurs, he is known as the 'father of paleobiology', even though he himself coined the term " paleophysiology " for

1742-532: The Albanian mountains, he was held hostage by the bandit Mustafa Lita, together with Bajazid Doda. Lita demanded ten thousand Turkish pounds for his release. In his memoirs Nopcsa described his elaborate plan to get out of this situation, which involved being taken to Prizren as a spy. He was eventually rescued by Doda's father, who had brought 'ten armed retainers'. In 1912 the Balkan states joined forces to drive out

1809-545: The German Phylogenie , introduced by Haeckel in 1866, and the Darwinian approach to classification became known as the "phyletic" approach. It can be traced back to Aristotle , who wrote in his Posterior Analytics , "We may assume the superiority ceteris paribus [other things being equal] of the demonstration which derives from fewer postulates or hypotheses." The modern concept of phylogenetics evolved primarily as

1876-645: The absence of genetic recombination . Phylogenetics can also aid in drug design and discovery. Phylogenetics allows scientists to organize species and can show which species are likely to have inherited particular traits that are medically useful, such as producing biologically active compounds - those that have effects on the human body. For example, in drug discovery, venom -producing animals are particularly useful. Venoms from these animals produce several important drugs, e.g., ACE inhibitors and Prialt ( Ziconotide ). To find new venoms, scientists turn to phylogenetics to screen for closely related species that may have

1943-696: The addition of another internal specifier was deemed unnecessary. Nodosauridae is traditionally composed of the basal clade Polacanthinae (sometimes recovered outside of the Nodosauridae), as well as the Panoplosaurini and Struthiosaurini within the Nodosaurinae . Nodosaurinae is defined in the PhyloCode as "the largest clade containing Nodosaurus textilis , but not Hylaeosaurus armatus , Mymoorapelta maysi , and Polacanthus foxii ". Panoplosaurini

2010-414: The basis of a computational classifier used to analyze real-world outbreaks. Computational predictions of transmission dynamics for each outbreak often align with known epidemiological data. Different transmission networks result in quantitatively different tree shapes. To determine whether tree shapes captured information about underlying disease transmission patterns, researchers simulated the evolution of

2077-469: The bones with Professor Eduard Suess , who encouraged him to study them. Following the professor's advice, he started studying geology at the University of Vienna in 1897, where he quickly advanced in his studies. He gave his first academic lecture in 1899 at the age of twenty-two. He acquired a PhD in geology in 1903 from the university; his doctorate focused on geologically mapping the area surrounding

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2144-436: The branching pattern and "degree of difference" to find a compromise between them. Usual methods of phylogenetic inference involve computational approaches implementing the optimality criteria and methods of parsimony , maximum likelihood (ML), and MCMC -based Bayesian inference . All these depend upon an implicit or explicit mathematical model describing the evolution of characters observed. Phenetics , popular in

2211-460: The characteristics of species to interpret their evolutionary relationships and origins. Phylogenetics focuses on whether the characteristics of a species reinforce a phylogenetic inference that it diverged from the most recent common ancestor of a taxonomic group. In the field of cancer research, phylogenetics can be used to study the clonal evolution of tumors and molecular chronology , predicting and showing how cell populations vary throughout

2278-400: The correctness of phylogenetic trees generated using fewer taxa and more sites per taxon on the x-axis to more taxa and fewer sites per taxon on the y-axis. With fewer taxa, more genes are sampled amongst the taxonomic group; in comparison, with more taxa added to the taxonomic sampling group, fewer genes are sampled. Each method has the same total number of nucleotide sites sampled. Furthermore,

2345-413: The data distribution. They may be used to quickly identify differences or similarities in the transmission data. Phylogenetic tools and representations (trees and networks) can also be applied to philology , the study of the evolution of oral languages and written text and manuscripts, such as in the field of quantitative comparative linguistics . Computational phylogenetics can be used to investigate

2412-426: The direction of inferred evolutionary transformations. In addition to their use for inferring phylogenetic patterns among taxa, phylogenetic analyses are often employed to represent relationships among genes or individual organisms. Such uses have become central to understanding biodiversity , evolution, ecology , and genomes . Phylogenetics is a component of systematics that uses similarities and differences of

2479-597: The discovery of more genetic relationships in biodiverse fields, which can aid in conservation efforts by identifying rare species that could benefit ecosystems globally. Whole-genome sequence data from outbreaks or epidemics of infectious diseases can provide important insights into transmission dynamics and inform public health strategies. Traditionally, studies have combined genomic and epidemiological data to reconstruct transmission events. However, recent research has explored deducing transmission patterns solely from genomic data using phylodynamics , which involves analyzing

2546-488: The dotted line represents a 1:1 accuracy between the two sampling methods. As seen in the graphic, most of the plotted points are located below the dotted line, which indicates gravitation toward increased accuracy when sampling fewer taxa with more sites per taxon. The research performed utilizes four different phylogenetic tree construction models to verify the theory; neighbor-joining (NJ), minimum evolution (ME), unweighted maximum parsimony (MP), and maximum likelihood (ML). In

2613-668: The emergence of biochemistry , organism classifications are now usually based on phylogenetic data, and many systematists contend that only monophyletic taxa should be recognized as named groups. The degree to which classification depends on inferred evolutionary history differs depending on the school of taxonomy: phenetics ignores phylogenetic speculation altogether, trying to represent the similarity between organisms instead; cladistics (phylogenetic systematics) tries to reflect phylogeny in its classifications by only recognizing groups based on shared, derived characters ( synapomorphies ); evolutionary taxonomy tries to take into account both

2680-599: The end of the war, Nopcsa's native Transylvania was ceded to Romania . As a consequence, the Baron of Felső-Szilvás lost his estates and other possessions in 1920. Compelled to find paid employment, he landed a job as the head of the Hungarian Geological Institute in 1925. But Nopcsa's tenure in the Geological Institute was short-lived, he soon became bored of the sedentary job. He went to Europe on

2747-505: The family estate. On 20 November 1906 Nopcsa met the then eighteen-year-old Bajazid Elmaz Doda in Bucharest and hired him as his secretary. Nopcsa later recounted this meeting in his memoir: [H]e has been the only person who has truly loved me and in whom I had full confidence, never doubting for a moment that he would misuse my trust. Additionally, Nopcsa was interested in Albania , which

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2814-472: The ground, which they would flap as they made a jump. The scales on its forearms would develop into feathers to aid this, and eventually allowing for flight. This theory found favor in the 1960s and later gained wide acceptance, though later fossil finds of tree-living feathered dinosaurs suggest the development of flight may have been more complex than Nopcsa envisioned. Additionally, Nopcsa's conclusion that at least some Mesozoic era reptiles were warm-blooded

2881-521: The holotype of Borealopelta markmitchelli , preserves a nearly complete set of armor in life position, as well as the keratin covering and mineralized remains of the underlying skin, which indicate reddish pigments in a countershading pattern. The family Nodosauridae was erected by Othniel Charles Marsh in 1890, and anchored on the genus Nodosaurus . The clade Nodosauridae was first informally defined by Paul Sereno in 1998 as "all ankylosaurs closer to Panoplosaurus than to Ankylosaurus ,"

2948-475: The majority of models, sampling fewer taxon with more sites per taxon demonstrated higher accuracy. Generally, with the alignment of a relatively equal number of total nucleotide sites, sampling more genes per taxon has higher bootstrapping replicability than sampling more taxa. However, unbalanced datasets within genomic databases make increasing the gene comparison per taxon in uncommonly sampled organisms increasingly difficult. The term "phylogeny" derives from

3015-618: The mid-20th century but now largely obsolete, used distance matrix -based methods to construct trees based on overall similarity in morphology or similar observable traits (i.e. in the phenotype or the overall similarity of DNA , not the DNA sequence ), which was often assumed to approximate phylogenetic relationships. Prior to 1950, phylogenetic inferences were generally presented as narrative scenarios. Such methods are often ambiguous and lack explicit criteria for evaluating alternative hypotheses. In phylogenetic analysis, taxon sampling selects

3082-528: The phylogenetic history of a species cannot be read directly from its ontogeny, as Haeckel thought would be possible, but characters from ontogeny can be (and have been) used as data for phylogenetic analyses; the more closely related two species are, the more apomorphies their embryos share. One use of phylogenetic analysis involves the pharmacological examination of closely related groups of organisms. Advances in cladistics analysis through faster computer programs and improved molecular techniques have increased

3149-510: The precision of phylogenetic determination, allowing for the identification of species with pharmacological potential. Historically, phylogenetic screens for pharmacological purposes were used in a basic manner, such as studying the Apocynaceae family of plants, which includes alkaloid-producing species like Catharanthus , known for producing vincristine , an antileukemia drug. Modern techniques now enable researchers to study close relatives of

3216-415: The progression of the disease and during treatment, using whole genome sequencing techniques. The evolutionary processes behind cancer progression are quite different from those in most species and are important to phylogenetic inference; these differences manifest in several areas: the types of aberrations that occur, the rates of mutation , the high heterogeneity (variability) of tumor cell subclones, and

3283-418: The properties of pathogen phylogenies. Phylodynamics uses theoretical models to compare predicted branch lengths with actual branch lengths in phylogenies to infer transmission patterns. Additionally, coalescent theory , which describes probability distributions on trees based on population size, has been adapted for epidemiological purposes. Another source of information within phylogenies that has been explored

3350-543: The relationship between two variables in pathogen transmission analysis, such as the number of infected individuals and the time since infection. These plots can help identify trends and patterns, such as whether the spread of the pathogen is increasing or decreasing over time, and can highlight potential transmission routes or super-spreader events. Box plots displaying the range, median, quartiles, and potential outliers datasets can also be valuable for analyzing pathogen transmission data, helping to identify important features in

3417-410: The relationships between several of the languages in a timeline, as well as the similarity between words and word order. There are three types of criticisms about using phylogenetics in philology, the first arguing that languages and species are different entities, therefore you can not use the same methods to study both. The second being how phylogenetic methods are being applied to linguistic data. And

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3484-575: The relationships between viruses e.g., all viruses are descendants of Virus A. HIV forensics uses phylogenetic analysis to track the differences in HIV genes and determine the relatedness of two samples. Phylogenetic analysis has been used in criminal trials to exonerate or hold individuals. HIV forensics does have its limitations, i.e., it cannot be the sole proof of transmission between individuals and phylogenetic analysis which shows transmission relatedness does not indicate direction of transmission. Taxonomy

3551-485: The same useful traits. The phylogenetic tree shows which species of fish have an origin of venom, and related fish they may contain the trait. Using this approach in studying venomous fish, biologists are able to identify the fish species that may be venomous. Biologist have used this approach in many species such as snakes and lizards. In forensic science , phylogenetic tools are useful to assess DNA evidence for court cases. The simple phylogenetic tree of viruses A-E shows

3618-481: The shape of phylogenetic trees, as illustrated in Fig. 1. Researchers have analyzed the structural characteristics of phylogenetic trees generated from simulated bacterial genome evolution across multiple types of contact networks. By examining simple topological properties of these trees, researchers can classify them into chain-like, homogeneous, or super-spreading dynamics, revealing transmission patterns. These properties form

3685-497: The species Mochlodon robustus , which he later renamed to Rhabdodon robustum in 1915. He also named Struthiosaurus transylvanicus , which he described in 1915. In 1928 he named the Teinurosaurus (meaning "extended tail lizard"). He named the turtle species Kallokibotion bajazidi , which literally means ' beautiful box of Bajazid '. The reason for this name was that the shell reminded him of Bajazid's arse. Nopcsa

3752-448: The study of the evolution of physiology and biology. Some of his works in this field exploited paleohistological data. Another of Nopcsa's theories that was ahead of its time was that birds evolved from ground-dwelling dinosaurs, which is the theory of cursorial origin of flight. He theorized that the Proavis , a theorized predecessor of birds, was running animal with forearms lifted off

3819-421: The third, discusses the types of data that is being used to construct the trees. Bayesian phylogenetic methods, which are sensitive to how treelike the data is, allow for the reconstruction of relationships among languages, locally and globally. The main two reasons for the use of Bayesian phylogenetics are that (1) diverse scenarios can be included in calculations and (2) the output is a sample of trees and not

3886-1382: The traditional dichotomous split between nodosaurids and ankylosaurids, their analyses resulted in a paraphyletic grade of these taxa comprising the monophyletic clades Panoplosauridae, Polacanthidae and Struthiosauridae. These results are displayed in Topology B below. Corresponding clades are shown in matching colors for clarity, and ⊞ buttons can be clicked to expand nodes: Sauroplites Mymoorapelta Dongyangopelta Gastonia Gargoyleosaurus Hoplitosaurus Polacanthus Peloroplites Taohelong Sauropelta Acantholipan Nodosaurus Niobrarasaurus Ahshislepelta Tatankacephalus Silvisaurus CPC 273 ( Aguja Formation specimen) Hungarosaurus Europelta Pawpawsaurus Borealopelta Stegopelta Struthiosaurus languedocensis Struthiosaurus transylvanicus Struthiosaurus austriacus Animantarx Panoplosaurus Patagopelta Texasetes Denversaurus Edmontonia longiceps Edmontonia rugosidens Kunbarrasaurus Paw Paw juvenile Hylaeosaurus Liaoningosaurus Crichtonpelta Chuanqilong Cedarpelta Aletopelta Later-diverging ankylosaurids Sarcolestes Franz Nopcsa von Fels%C5%91-Szilv%C3%A1s Nopcsa

3953-413: The type genus Nodosaurus was required as an internal specifier. In formally defining Nodosauridae, Madzia and colleagues followed the previously established use for the clade, defining it as the largest clade including Nodosaurus textilis but not Ankylosaurus magniventris . As all phylogenies referenced included both Panoplosaurus and Nodosaurus within the same group relative to Ankylosaurus ,

4020-629: The work of the Albanian Congress of Trieste , published his notes on the congress that became of particular historical interest. He left the Albanological part of his estate along with a letter of manuscripts to be published to Norbert Jokl , a renowned specialist in Albanian studies and Nopcsa's former colleague. At that time, Nopcsa's material consisted of thousands of pages of notes, sketches, and finished text. Subsequently, this library came into possession of Mid'hat Bey Frashëri . When Frashëri

4087-572: Was a province of the Ottoman Empire contending for independence in that time. He was one of the few outsiders who ventured into the mountainous areas in the north of Albania. He soon learned the Albanian dialects and customs. Eventually, he got on good terms with the leaders of the Albanian nationalist resistance who fought against the Turks in the region. Nopcsa gave passionate speeches and smuggled in weapons. In 1907 on one of his expeditions into

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4154-428: Was also interested in evolutionary theory, especially on macroevolution, on which the fossil record can yield relevant data. Nopcsa was also an important geologist. Indeed, Nopcsa was one of the first scholars to study the geology of the western Balkans , particularly northern Albania. Nopcsa became fascinated with Albania during his lifetime, probably through the tales of Albania's mountain tribesmen, to which he

4221-649: Was an island, Hațeg Island (now the Haţeg or Hatzeg basin in Romania) during the Mesozoic era. He theorized that "limited resources" found on islands commonly have an effect of "reducing the size of animals" over the generations, producing a localized form of dwarfism . Nopcsa's theory of insular dwarfism —also known as the island rule —is today widely accepted. Additional pygmy sauropods, named Europasaurus , were recently discovered in northern Germany. Nopcsa also created

4288-658: Was born in 1877 in Déva, Transylvania , Kingdom of Hungary (today Deva, Romania ), to the Hungarian Nopcsa aristocratic family of Romanian origin. He was the son of Elek Nopcsa  [ hu ] (1848-1918), a member of the Hungarian Parliament and his wife, Matylda Henrietta Żeleński z Żelanki (1852-1938). In 1895 Nopcsa's younger sister Ilona discovered dinosaur bones at the family estate at Szacsal (today part of Sânpetru, Sântămăria-Orlea , Romania). He shared

4355-455: Was first introduced by Louis Drašković, a man thought to be his first lover. During his lifetime Nopcsa published more than fifty scientific studies concerning Albania, covering a wide range of linguistics , folklore , ethnology , history and kanun (that is, Albanian customary law). He was one of the leading experts on Albania in his time. After Nopcsa's death, several of his important manuscripts were left unpublished. He participated in

4422-570: Was forced to flee the country, Nopcsa's materials were confiscated by the communist regime of Enver Hoxha . Eventually, Nopcsa's manuscripts, drawings, and completed writings formed the core of the Albanological section of Albania's National Library . Season 7, Episode 9 of the Bad Gays podcast covers Nopsca's life. Phylogenetic analyses In biology , phylogenetics ( / ˌ f aɪ l oʊ dʒ ə ˈ n ɛ t ɪ k s , - l ə -/ )

4489-560: Was it published in German and it was later translated to English in 2014 as Traveler, Scholar, Political Adventurer: A Transylvanian Baron at the Birth of Albanian Independence , edited by Robert Elsie . Nopcsa's main contribution to paleontology – and hence " paleobiology " – was, that he was one of the first researchers who tried to "put flesh onto bones." At a time when paleontologists were mainly interested in assembling bones, he tried to deduce

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