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Palaeontology

Inside the oldest bird brain

Nature volume 430, pages 619–620 (2004)Cite this article

Did Archaeopteryx, the most primitive known bird, have ‘the right stuff’? Looking into its skull with advanced technology provides insight into the dinosaurian transition to birds, and the evolution of flight.

It has also been the central player in the debate on the origin of birds and avian flight. Although discoveries of feathered dinosaurs and archaic birds from China have advanced our understanding of the transition to birds1,2, the Archaeopteryx skeletons collected from Jurassic limestones in southern Germany remain (at 147 million years old) the oldest undisputed avian fossils, and the most primitive3. The fossils have been scrutinized by so many scientists over the past 140 years that it might seem that nothing new could be learned. But a landmark study by Domínguez Alonso et al., on page 666 of this issue4, goes back to the first skeleton ever found to present exciting data on the brain and sense organs. The results have implications for both the biology of Archaeopteryx and the evolutionary transition to birds.

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Figure 1: Iconic Archaeopteryx.

K. A. VON ZITTEL

Figure 2: Bird brain?

P. DOMÍNGUEZ ALONSO

References

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  1. Department of Biomedical Sciences, Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine, Athens, 45701, Ohio, USA

    Lawrence M. Witmer

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  1. Lawrence M. Witmer
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Witmer, L. Inside the oldest bird brain. Nature 430, 619–620 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/430619a

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/430619a

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