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Mars Base

True colors of some fossil feathers now in doubt (w/ Video) - 0 views

phys.org/...rue-fossil-feathers-video.html

scibyte88 Fossil-Feather

shared by Mars Base on 29 Mar 13 - No Cached
  • evidence for the colors of feathers—especially melanin-based colors—can be altered during fossilization
  • past reconstructions of the original colors of feathers in some fossil birds and dinosaurs may be flawed
  • In modern birds, black, brown, and some reddish-brown colors are produced by tiny granules of the pigment melanin
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  • These features—called melanosomes—are preserved in many fossil feathers, and their precise size and shape have been used to reconstruct the original colors of fossil feathers.
  • had no idea whether melanosomes could survive the fossilisation process intact
  • experiments show that this is not the case. Our results cast a cautionary light on studies of fossil feather color and suggest that some previous reconstructions of the original plumage colors of fossils may not be accurate
  • experimental technique pioneered in the group's recent study on the colors of fossil insects
  • simulated high pressures and temperatures that are found deep under the Earth's surface
  • team used feathers of different colors and from different species, but the geometry of the melanosomes in all feathers changed during the experiments
  • This study will lead to better interpretations of the original plumage colors of diverse feathered dinosaurs and fossil birds
Mars Base

Giant Feathered Tyrannosaur Found in China | Wired Science | Wired.com - 0 views

www.wired.com/...yutyrannus-huali-feathers

scibyte41 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 05 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • Artist's impression of Yutyrannus and the smaller Beipiaosaurus. Image: Brian Choo
  • covered from head to tail in downy feathers.
  • 30 feet long and weighing 3,000 pounds, Y. huali wasn’t so large as T. rex,
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  • found in the Yixian Formation, a fossil deposit in northeastern China that over the last two decades has yielded dozens of dinosaur skeletons so finely preserved that it’s possible to discern feather-like structures.
  • early feathered members of the tyrannosaur family have been found, they were very smal
  • If the primary purpose of feathers was insulation, a possibility suggested by the feathers’ down-like shape, then larger tyrannosaurs might not have needed them. Thanks to small surface-to-volume body ratios, large-bodied animals tend to maintain heat easily.
  • didn’t know whether these larger-bodied forms would show as many.”
  • significance of Y. huali is its body size and the apparent density of feather-like structures
  • Yutyrannus skull. Image: Zang Hailong
  • What were tyrannosaur feathers used for? Might the king of dinosaurs have strutted like a peacock?
  • At this point we don’t have any data on the coloration of the plumage
Mars Base

T. Rex Has Another Fine, Feathered Cousin - Science News - 0 views

www.sciencenews.org/...other_fine%2C_feathered_cousin

scibyte41 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 05 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • From 125-million-year-old rocks, scientists have unearthed the remains of a new species of extensively feathered dinosaurs that weighed up to about 1,400 kilograms and stretched 9 meters from nose to tail.
  • fossils, from one adult and two younger dinos, were unearthed in northeast China
  • region known for keeping soft tissues of ancient animals well-preserved
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  • Based on the shapes of the jaw and skull bones found in the fossils, the team concluded that the three animals belonged to the same species and were tyrannosaurs
  • broader classification of two-legged meat-eaters called theropods
  • biggest of the newly described creatures — the largest extensively feathered dino known to date — was about one-quarter the weight of its relative, Tyrannosaurus rex
  • smaller dinosaur is named Yutyrannus hauli, which translates to “beautiful feathered tyrant
  • new species had feathers that were at least 15 centimeters long and look as if they covered the dinosaur’s skin
  • might have given the dinosaur a shaggy appearance
  • the full extent of this covering is difficult to confirm because the specimens aren’t complete.
  • For the vast majority of dinosaurs we only have bone. We don’t have feathers or featherless skin
  • Full-feathered dinosaurs that have been discovered so far have been much smaller
  • much more likely to lose body heat because of their size
  • scientists thought these petite creatures used a fluffy layer to stay warm
  • study authors think that the newfound dinos might have also needed some insulation
  • But Norell is not convinced
  • Many large animals that live in warm climates, such as modern giraffes and wildebeests, have external covering but don’t need it for insulation, he says.
  • feathers might also have helped the dinosaurs show off and attract mates.
  • Other traits the new dinos had include a high, bumpy nose plate, known as a midline crest
  • unclear what type of posture the animals maintained, Sullivan estimates that the full-grown dino stood about 2.5 meters tall.
Mars Base

Warm and fuzzy T. rex? New evidence surprises - 0 views

www.physorg.com/...012-04-fuzzy-rex-evidence.html

scibyte41 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 05 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • Artists' depiction of Yutyrannus huali. Artwork by Lida Xing and Yi Liu.
  • discovery of a giant meat-eating dinosaur sporting a downy coat has some scientists reimagining the look of Tyrannosaurus rex.
  • making it the largest feathered dinosaur ever found.
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  • Scientists have long debated whether gigantic dinosaurs lost their feathers the bigger they got or were just not as extensively covered.
  • this is the first direct sign of a huge, shaggy dinosaur
  • name is a blend of Latin and Mandarin, which translates to "beautiful feathered tyrant."
  • recovered from a quarry in China's Liaoning province by a private fossil dealer
  • Most striking were the remains of down-like feathers on the neck and arm
  • coverage was patchy, scientists suspected the species had feathers over much of its body
  • would have felt like touching "long, thick fur
  • compared it to the feathers of an emu.
  • Y. huali would have reached T. rex's chest.
  • dino-fuzz likely provided insulation, though camouflage or showing it off like a peacock could not be ruled out.
  • Since T. rex is related to this newfound feathery species, chances are good that T. rex was feathered as well
Mars Base

Four-winged dinosaur's feathers were black with iridescent sheen - 0 views

www.physorg.com/...feathers-black-iridescent.html

scibyte37 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 09 Mar 12 - No Cached
  • team of American and Chinese researchers
  • color and detailed feather pattern
  • Microraptor, a pigeon-sized, four-winged dinosaur that lived about 130 million years ago
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  • fossilized plumage, which had hues of black and blue like a crow
  • earliest record of iridescent feather color
  • Although its anatomy is very similar to birds, Mircroraptor is considered a non-avian dinosaur
  • placed in the group of dinosaurs called dromaeosaurs that includes Velociraptor
  • color displayed by many modern birds is produced partially by arrays of pigment-bearing organelles called melanosomes
  • t a hundred of which can fit across a human ha
  • melanosome's structure is constant for a given color
  • imaging power of scanning electron microscopes, paleontologists recently started analyzing the shape of melanosomes in well-preserved fossilized feather imprints
  • comparing these patterns to those in living birds, scientists can infer the color of dinosaurs that lived many millions of years ago
  • Iridescence is widespread in modern birds and is frequently used in displays
  • Statistical analysis of the data predicts that Microraptor was completely black with a glossy, weakly iridescent blue sheen.
  • researchers also made predictions about the purpose of the dinosaur's tail
  • Once thought to be a broad, teardrop-shaped surface meant to help with flight
  • researchers think that the tail feather was ornamental and likely evolved for courtship and other social interactions, not for aerodynamics
  • actually much narrower with two elongate feathers
  • findings also contradict previous interpretations that Microraptor was a nocturnal animal because dark glossy plumage is not a trait found in modern nighttime birds.
Mars Base

"Beautiful" Squirrel-Tail Dinosaur Fossil Upends Feather Theory - 0 views

news.nationalgeographic.com/...urs-fossil-science-proceedings

scibyte53 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 03 Jul 12 - No Cached
  • Previously, paleontologists have found feathers only on coelurosaurs—small, birdlike dinosaurs that evolved later than so-called megalosaurs suchas Sciurumimus.
  • the oldest known meat-eating dinosaur with feathers
  • hatchling had a large skull, short hind limbs, and long, hairlike plumage on its midsection, back, and tail.
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  • Because Sciurumimus is from a completely different branch of the dinosaur family tree from the coelurosaurs, the new fossil suggests feathered dinosaurs were the norm, not the exception
Mars Base

All Dinosaurs May Have Had Feathers - Science News - 0 views

www.sciencenews.org/...inosaurs_may_have_had_feathers

scibyte53 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 03 Jul 12 - No Cached
  • A newly discovered, nearly complete fossilized skeleton hints that all dinosaurs may have sported feathers.
  • Eventually, the study’s authors hope to figure out the color of the dinosaur’s feathers. But because color tests require fossil snippets, scientists would have to clip bits from the dinosaur’s remains. And since this specimen is one of a kind, researchers aren’t quite ready to disturb it.
  • So far, nearly all of the feathered dinosaurs ever discovered have come from eastern Asia. But excavators unearthed this fossil in southern Germany
Mars Base

A 'chicken from hell' dinosaur: Large feathered dinosaur species discovered in North Am... - 0 views

phys.org/...-dinosaur-large-feathered.html

scibyte125 dinosaur

shared by Mars Base on 20 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • Scientists
  • unveiled the discovery, naming and description of a sharp-clawed, 500-pound, bird-like dinosaur
  • that roamed the Dakotas with T. rex 66 million years ago
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  • 11 ½-foot-long
  • "It was a giant raptor, but with a chicken-like head and presumably feathers
  • stood about 10 feet tall
  • Three partial skeletons of the dinosaur – almost making up a full skeleton – were excavated from the uppermost level of the Hell Creek rock formation in North and South Dakota
  • The new dinosaur was 11 ½ feet long, almost 5 feet tall at the hip and weighed an estimated 440 to 660 pounds
  • Anzu is the largest oviraptorosaur found in North America
  • Oviraptorosaurs are a group of dinosaurs that are closely related to birds and often have strange, cassowary-like crests on their heads
  • The researchers believe Anzu, with large sharp claws, was an omnivore, eating vegetation, small animals and perhaps eggs while living on a wet floodplain
  • One appears to have a broken and healed rib, and the other has evidence of some sort of trauma to a toe
  • Like many "new" dinosaurs, Anzu wyliei fossils were discovered some years ago, and it took more time for researchers to study the fossils and write and publish a formal scientific description
Mars Base

Scientists study rare dinosaur skin fossil to determine skin colour for first time - 0 views

phys.org/...rare-dinosaur-skin-fossil.html

shared by Mars Base on 04 May 13 - No Cached
  • this is only the third three-dimensional dinosaur skin specimen ever found worldwide
  • One of the only well preserved dinosaur skin samples ever found is being tested at the Canadian Light Source (CLS) synchrotron to determine skin colour and to explain why the fossilized specimen remained intact after 70-million years.
  • the hadrosaur, a duck-billed dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous period (100-65 million years ago), was found close to a river bed near Grande Prairie, Alberta.
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  • One question is whether the hadrosaur skin was green or grey, like most dinosaurs are portrayed, or was it a completely different colour
  • the CLS to look at unique structures called melanosomes, cellular organelles the contain pigments that control the color of an animal's skin.
  • "If we are able to observe the melanosomes and their shape, it will be the first time pigments have been identified in the skin of a dinosaur
  • There has been research that proved the colour of some dinosaur feathers, but never skin
  • Using light at the CLS mid-infrared (Mid-IR) beamline, Barbi and CLS scientists are also looking for traces of organic and inorganic elements that could help determine the hadrosaur's diet and why the skin sample was preserved almost intact
  • the sample is placed in the path of the infrared beam and light reflects off of it.
  • , chemical bonds of certain compounds will create different vibrations
  • For example, proteins, sugars and fats still found in the skin will create unique vibrational frequencies that scientists can measure
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