The Feathers are Flying

The link between dinosaurs and birds was established back in the 1860s when fossils of the distinctly dinosaur and bird-like Archopteryx turned up in some German shale quarries.  Many biologists today argue that all modern birds should be considered dinosaurs.  It is an argument that makes sense.

However, it was only much more recently (15-20 years) that fossils collected in China were discovered that suggested that feathers were quite common within a larger group of dinosaurs, the theropods.  I was able to see some of these fossils when visiting Brisbane, Australia, where they were on loan from China, back in 2004.  This group of dinosaurs includes the velociraptors and Tyrannosaurus rex of Jurassic Park movie fame.  It seems the movie was just a few years behind the discovery.

Now however, feathers, or at least what seem likely to be feathers have turned up in an entirely different lineage of dinosaurs, the ornithosaurs (includes the Triceratops).  This was just reported by Hai-Lu You and colleagues in the journal Science.  Shown above is an artists reconstruction of what these newly discovered dinosaurs, Tianyulong confuciusi, may have looked like.  This suggests that either feathers evolved more than once in different lineages of dinosaurs or that the earliest ancestors of the dinosaurs had feathers.  It certainly creates a challenge for artists and museums with respect to how dinosaurs should be shown.

The feathers will undoubtedly be flying at the next international paleontology meeting.

Artist credit: L-D Xing.