Teresa Manera de Bianco is an Argentine paleontologist and geologist. She was a professor in the geology department of the

Universidad Nacional del Sur The National University of the South (in Spanish: ''Universidad Nacional del Sur'', UNS) is the largest national university in southern Argentina. The university was founded on January 5, 1956, and absorbed what had been the Technological Instit ...

. She conducts research on

vertebrate paleontology Vertebrate paleontology is the subfield of paleontology that seeks to discover, through the study of fossilized remains, the behavior, reproduction and appearance of extinct vertebrates (animals with vertebrae and their descendants). It also t ...

and topics related to vertebrate footprints and remains from the

Quaternary The Quaternary ( ) is the current and most recent of the three periods of the Cenozoic Era in the geologic time scale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS), as well as the current and most recent of the twelve periods of the ...

period. In 1986, she discovered a stretch of land near Pehuen Co containing 12,000-year-old

fossilized footprints A fossil track or ichnite (Greek "''ιχνιον''" (''ichnion'') – a track, trace or footstep) is a fossilized footprint. This is a type of trace fossil. A fossil trackway is a sequence of fossil tracks left by a single organism. Over the year ...

of at least 22 distinct species, including those of the extinct sloth ''

Megatherium ''Megatherium'' ( ; from Greek () 'great' + () 'beast') is an extinct genus of ground sloths endemic to South America that lived from the Early Pliocene through the end of the Late Pleistocene. It is best known for the elephant-sized type spe ...

'' and

Glyptodont Glyptodonts are an extinct clade of large, heavily armoured armadillos, reaching up to in height, and maximum body masses of around 2 tonnes. They had short, deep skulls, a fused vertebral column, and a large bony carapace made up of hundreds o ...

Early life and education

Teresa Manera was born into a Bahian family of Italian immigrants. She studied at the

, earning a degree in geological sciences in 1968 and a PhD in geology in 1972.

Career and research

Manera spent much of her career as a professor of paleontology in the Department of Geology of the

Bahía Blanca Bahía Blanca (; English: ''White Bay''), colloquially referred to by its own local inhabitants as simply Bahía, is a city in the Buenos Aires Province, Buenos Aires province of Argentina, centered on the northwestern end of the eponymous Blanc ...

. She worked at the university from 1968 to 2015, starting out as a teaching assistant. Manera conducts research on

and topics related to vertebrate footprints and remains from the

period. Manera settled in

Punta Alta Punta Alta is a city in Argentina, about 25 kilometers southeast of Bahía Blanca. It has a population of 57,293. It is the capital ("cabecera") of the Coronel Rosales Partido. It was founded on 2 July 1898. The city is located near the Atlant ...

, where she began collecting fossils for a museum. Following a storm in October 1986, she and her family discovered a three-kilometre stretch of land east of Pehuen Co with a sedimentary rock platform near the beach containing 12,000-year-old

of at least 22 distinct species, including large mammals such as the extinct sloth ''

'' as well as

Macrauchenia ''Macrauchenia'' ("long llama", based on the now-invalid llama genus, ''Auchenia'', from Greek "big neck") is an extinct genus of large ungulate native to South America from the Pliocene or Middle Pleistocene to the end of the Late Pleistocene. I ...

mastodon A mastodon, from Ancient Greek μαστός (''mastós''), meaning "breast", and ὀδούς (''odoús'') "tooth", is a member of the genus ''Mammut'' (German for 'mammoth'), which was endemic to North America and lived from the late Miocene to ...

s, and bears. Footprints of

s were discovered at the site in 2016. Following the discovery, Manera published a paper with fellow UNS academic Silvia Ramallo. She led a project with students from the Universidad Nacional del Sur to create molds and replicas of the fossilized footprints. A 2005 bill to make the archeological site a natural reserve was approved by the Government of Buenos Aires. Through Law Nº 13.394, the site was declared the Pehuen Co-Monte Hermoso Provincial Geological, Paleontological and Archaeological Reserve. The site was added to a tentative

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

list of

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

s in 2012. Manera discovered the holotype of the extinct turtle species ''Yaminuechelys gasparinii'' in the

La Colonia Formation The La Colonia Formation is a geological Formation (geology), formation in Argentina whose strata date back to the Late Cretaceous. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation.Weishampel et al., 2004, pp.600- ...

in 2001.De la Fuente, M., F. Lapparent de Broin, and T. Manera de Bianco. 2001, The oldest and first nearly complete skeleton of a chelid, of the Hydromedusa sub-group (Chelidae, Pleurodira), from the Upper Cretaceous of Patagonia. ''Bullettin de la Société Géologique de France''. 172:237–244. In 2014, Manera was part of a team that described the Early Pliocene fossil fish genus ''Plesiopercichthys'' after discovering its type species, ''Plesiopercichthys dimartinoi'', in the Monte Hermoso Formation. Manera is the author of numerous research papers, book chapters and books. She authored the 2008 book ''Yacimiento Paleoicnológico de Pehuen-Có. Un patrimonio natural en peligro''. Her books ''Las huellas de los gigantes'' and ''La herencia de Darwin a la paleantología regional'' were published by EdiUNS.

Awards and honors

Manera has been the honorary scientific director of the Carlos Darwin Museum of Natural Sciences in Punta Alta since 1990. She won a Rolex Award for Enterprise in 2004 and was declared an illustrious citizen of Rosaleña in 2014.

Selected publications

* *Manera de Bianco, T., Aramayo, S. A. y Ortiz, H. O. (2005). "Trazas de pelaje en icnitas de megaterios en el Yacimiento Paleoicnológico de Pehuen Có (Pleistoceno Tardío), provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina". ''21º Jornadas Argentinas de Paleontología de Vertebrados''. * *

References

External links

Museo Darwin
{{DEFAULTSORT:Manera de Bianco, Teresa Living people Argentine paleontologists Academic staff of Universidad Nacional del Sur Women paleontologists Argentine geologists People from Bahía Blanca Year of birth missing (living people)