Ruffling feathers: Birds and dinosaurs

The suggestion that non-avian theropod dinosaurs are closely related to birds is still a source of heated debate amongst palaeotologists. A fossil that may prove crucial ammunition in this debate takes a bow this week. Found in the very productive Yixian Formation in China, a small dinosaur covered in feather like structures has been preserved in a spread-eagle position making it possible to establish the distribution of feather-like filaments in unprecedented detail. The indications are that these filaments are definitely feather homologues, and their presence in a fossil of this type suggests that the development of feathers was unrelated to the origin of flight in birds.

The distribution of integumentary structures in a feathered dinosaur
QIANG JI, MARK A. NORELL, KE-QIN GAO, SHU-AN JI & DONG REN
Nature 410, 1084-1088 (26 April 2001)
| First Paragraph | Full Text | PDF (838 K) | Supplementary Information |

Palaeontology: Ruffling feathers
HANS-DIETER SUES
The evolution of feathers and flight were generally thought to be inextricably linked. But new fossils from China show that feathers pre-dated the origin of flight and of birds.
Nature 410, 1036-1037 (26 April 2001)
| Full Text | PDF (156 K) |

26 April 2001 table of contents