Contributors -- Preface -- 1. Smilodon : a short history of becoming the iconic sabertooth / H. Gregory McDonald -- 2. The phylogenetic context of Smilodon / Lars Werdelin and Therese Flink -- 3.

In the history of teeth, perhaps no tooth is as famous as the saber tooth. These long, blade-like canines seem almost perfectly optimized to kill prey. They've evolved at least five times in mammals, ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Cringe. That's what most people do when they look at fossils of the impressive, eight-inch-long canines of the now extinct sabertooth tiger, Smilodon fatalis. But Frank Mendel, a ...