<
https://theconversation.com/new-fossil-foot-analysis-reveals-the-surprising-and-varied-lifestyles-of-dinosaur-bird-ancestors-196798>
"Have you ever eaten chicken feet? If you haven’t, you might be surprised to
learn there’s actually quite a bit of flesh down there. And scales too! They’re
wonderful – and informative – pieces of engineering.
As someone whose speciality is working on fossilised dinosaur skin, I have more
than a passing interest in bird feet and the scales of other reptiles (yes,
birds are reptiles too).
In a paper published today in
Nature Communications, we describe how we used
some extraordinary fossils to reveal the varied lifestyles in the transition
from ground-dwelling dinosaur to flying bird.
Because the carnivorous theropod dinosaurs – a group of bipedal dinosaurs
characterised by hollow bones and three-toed feet – eventually evolved into
birds, the two groups share a lot of similarities.
So, we can use birds as a model for reconstructing the behaviour and lifestyles
of extinct dinosaurs."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
