Fossilized fragments of a skeleton, hidden within a rock the size of a grapefruit, have helped upend one of the longest-standing assumptions about the origins of modern birds.
Evolution
Nov 30, 2022
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567
The asymmetrical flight feathers of their wings are among the most distinctive features of living birds. But how are these feathers actually constructed, and when did they first appear in evolutionary history?
Evolution
Feb 16, 2015
3
121
Fossils of the oldest member of the lineage to which today's birds belong has been found in Hebei province of Northern China. The discovery pushes back the evolutionary record for birds by nearly 6m years and challenges the ...
Archaeology
May 7, 2015
2
50
Dinosaurs were the largest animals to ever walk Earth, and they ruled the planet for more than 160 million years. The long-necked Argentinosaurus, with back vertebrae almost two metres high, possibly grew to 30 metres long ...
Archaeology
Jul 16, 2013
5
0
Birds have an enormously long evolutionary history: The earliest of them, the famed Archaeopteryx, lived 150 million years ago in what is today southern Germany. However, whether these early birds were capable of flying—and ...
Archaeology
Oct 6, 2015
11
1077
The absence of teeth or "edentulism" has evolved on multiple occasions within vertebrates including birds, turtles, and a few groups of mammals such as anteaters, baleen whales and pangolins. Where early birds are concerned, ...
Archaeology
Dec 11, 2014
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0
Birds are the most diverse clade on the planet, and the skull of the living bird is one of the most highly modified and morphologically variable regions of their skeleton. The large diversity of enantiornithine birds (a group ...
Archaeology
Mar 21, 2011
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0
Hunting wild animals has been practised by humans for millions of years; however, the extraction of wildlife for subsistence and commercialisation has become a major biodiversity threat in recent decades. Meanwhile, over-exploitation ...
Ecology
Jan 6, 2020
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14
The predentary bone is one of the most enigmatic skeletal elements in avian evolution. Located at the tip of the lower jaw, this bone is absent in more primitive birds and in living birds; it is thought to have been lost ...
Archaeology
Nov 19, 2019
0
289
Flocks of birds, schools of fish, and groups of any other living organisms might have a mathematical function in common. Studying aquatic microorganisms, Andrea Giometto, a researcher EPFL and Eawag, showed that for each ...
Plants & Animals
Mar 4, 2013
4
0
