Formation of sedimentary layers of white clay, Tamilnadu, India

Fossil site for wood fossils, Tamilnadu, India

Fossil site in Kerala, India

Fossil site in Kerala, India

Fossil wood park maintained by geological survey of India at Tamilnadu

Cretaceous fossil sites india

Fossils in rack:-Cyad

Fossils in rack:-echiniderms

Fossils in rack:-Rastellum sp

Pre-historic seabed, Cretaceous period

WFS News: Oldest Frog Relative from North America

March 14th, 2019 Riffin

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It’s possible that during the Triassic period, the crocodile-like phytosaur snapped at a frog-like creature, but missed. It’s a good thing it did, because 216 million years later, paleontologists have found the fossils of these tiny creatures, the oldest known frog relative from North America, a new study finds.

This frog — nicknamed the Chinle frog because it was found in the Chinle Formation of northern Arizona — is a big finding, but the creature itself was small, just over 0.5 inches (1.3 centimeters) long.

“The Chinle frog could fit on the end of your finger,” study lead researcher Michelle Stocker, an assistant professor of geosciences at Virginia Tech, said in a statement.

An artist’s interpretation of the newly discovered Chinle frog that’s dangling from the jaw of a phytosaur, a heavily armoured semi-aquatic reptile.Credit: Andrey Atuchin/Virginia Tech

The frog fossils were found next to the fossils of the crocodile-like phytosaur and those of early dinosaurs, the researchers said. The scientists, however, didn’t find entire frog skeletons, but rather a few fragmented ilium, or hip bones, from several of these ancient frogs during an excavation in May 2018. But they hope to find more of the frogs’ fossils soon, which is why they haven’t given the creature a scientific name yet.

They are still sifting through the dirt and rock excavated at the site, where they expect to find more skull and skeletal material from the frogs — findings they say will be more informative about the identity of this kind of creature, Stocker said.

The team noted that while Chinle specimens are distant relatives of frogs, they are not the direct ancestor of modern frogs. But they’re still salientians — a group that includes living frogs and their closely related, extinct relatives.

In fact, the Chinle frog is the oldest known salientian from near the equator, the researchers noted.

That’s because during the Triassic period, when these frog-like animals lived, Arizona wasn’t where it is today. Instead, the Grand Canyon state was once part of the supercontinent Pangaea and was located about 10 degrees north of the equator, the researchers said.

An analysis of the frogs’ hip bones shows that the species shares more features with modern frogs and Prosalirus, an early Jurassic frog discovered in the present-day Navajo Nation, than it does with Triadobatrachus, an early Triassic frog found in modern-day Madagascar.

“These are the oldest frogs from near the equator,” Stocker said. “The oldest frogs overall are roughly 250 million years old from Madagascarand Poland, but those specimens are from higher latitudes [than the Chinle frog] and not equatorial.”

The discovery of the Chinle frog may also be a sign of things to come. “Now [that] we know that tiny frogs were present approximately 215 million years ago from North America, we may be able to find other members of the modern vertebrate communities in the Triassic period,” study co-researcher Sterling Nesbitt, an assistant professor of geosciences at Virginia Tech, said in the statement.

The study was published online today (Feb. 27) in the journal Biology Letters.

Source: article by  Laura Geggel, Associate Editor, livescience.com

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WFS News: Computer simulations on swimming of Ichthyosaurs

March 8th, 2019 Riffin

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Using computer simulations and 3D models, palaeontologists from the University of Bristol have uncovered more detail on how Mesozoic sea dragons swam.

The research, published today in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, sheds new light on their energy demands while swimming, showing that even the first ichthyosaurs had body shapes well adapted to minimise resistance and maximise volume, in a similar way to modern dolphins.

Digital models of the ichthyosaurs analysed in this study shown in their phylogenetic context. Simplified phylogeny

Digital models of the ichthyosaurs analysed in this study shown in their phylogenetic context. Simplified phylogeny

Ichthyosaurs are an extinct group of sea-going reptiles that lived during the Mesozoic Era, around 248-93.9 million years ago.

During their evolution, they changed shape substantially, from having narrow, lizard-like bodies to more streamlined fish-shaped bodies.

It was assumed that the change in body shape made them more efficient swimmers, especially by reducing the drag of the body, in other words, the resistance to movement.

Drag coefficients of nine ichthyosaurs and a modern analogue, the bottlenose dolphin. (a,b) CFD-computed total drag coefficients of nine ichthyosaurs and a bottlenose dolphin without (a) and with (b) limbs at Reynolds numbers from 106 to 5 × 107. (c,d) Comparison of the drag coefficients and their mean values (in grey) between taxa, without (c) and with (d) limbs; two-sample t-tests between groups not significant (NS). (e,f) Mean values of the drag coefficient of ichthyosaurs plotted against the mean occurrence age for each taxon, without (e) and with (f) fins; no correlation detected, Kendall's τ = −0.29, p = 0.28, NS (no limbs); Kendall's τ = −0.22, p = 0.39, NS (with limbs). Ichthyosaurs from the ‘basal grade’ are highlighted in yellow, the ‘intermediate grade’ in green and the ‘fish-shaped ichthyosaurs' in blue. The bottlenose dolphin Tursiops is highlighted in red. (g) Two-dimensional plots of flow velocity magnitude (Re = 5 × 106; inlet velocity of 5 m s−1).

Drag coefficients of nine ichthyosaurs and a modern analogue, the bottlenose dolphin. (a,b) CFD-computed total drag coefficients of nine ichthyosaurs and a bottlenose dolphin without (a) and with (b) limbs at Reynolds numbers from 106 to 5 × 107. (c,d) Comparison of the drag coefficients and their mean values (in grey) between taxa, without (c) and with (d) limbs; two-sample t-tests between groups not significant (NS). (e,f) Mean values of the drag coefficient of ichthyosaurs plotted against the mean occurrence age for each taxon, without (e) and with (f) fins; no correlation detected, Kendall’s τ = −0.29, p = 0.28, NS (no limbs); Kendall’s τ = −0.22, p = 0.39, NS (with limbs). Ichthyosaurs from the ‘basal grade’ are highlighted in yellow, the ‘intermediate grade’ in green and the ‘fish-shaped ichthyosaurs’ in blue. The bottlenose dolphin Tursiops is highlighted in red. (g) Two-dimensional plots of flow velocity magnitude (Re = 5 × 106; inlet velocity of 5 m s−1).

If they could produce less resistance for a given body mass, they would have more power for swimming, or swimming would take less effort. Then they could swim longer distances or reach faster speeds.

Susana Gutarra, a PhD student in palaeobiology at the University of Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences, said: “To test whether fish-shaped bodies helped ichthyosaurs reduce the energy demands of swimming, we made 3D models of several different ichthyosaurs.

“We also created a model of a bottlenose dolphin, a living species which can be observed in the wild, so we could test if the method worked.”

Dr Colin Palmer, a hydrodynamics expert and a collaborator, added: “Susana used classic methods from ship design to test these ancient reptiles.

“The software builds a “virtual water tank” where we can control variables like the temperature, density and speed or water, and that allow us to measure all resulting forces.

“The model ichthyosaurs were put into this “tank,” and fluid flow conditions modelled, in the same way ship designers test different hull shapes to minimize drag and improve performance.”

Professor Mike Benton, also from Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences and a collaborator, said: “Much to our surprise, we found that the drastic changes to ichthyosaur body shape through millions of years did not really reduce drag very much.

“All of them had low-drag designs, and body shape must have changed from long and slender to dolphin-like for another reason. It seems that body size mattered as well.”

Susana Gutarra added: “The first ichthyosaurs were quite small, about the size of an otter, and later ones reached sizes of 5-20 metres in length.

“When we measured flow over different body shapes at different sizes, we found that large bodies reduced the mass-specific energy demands of steady swimming.”

Dr Benjamin Moon, another collaborator from Bristol’s School of Earth Sciences, said: “There was a shift in swimming style during ichthyosaur evolution. The most primitive ichthyosaurs swam by body undulations and later on they acquired broad tails for swimming by beating their tails (more efficient for fast and sustained swimming).

However, we found that some very early ichthyosaurs, like Utatsusaurus, might have been well suited for endurance swimming thanks to their large size, in spite of swimming by body undulations. Our results provide a very interesting insight into the ecology of ichthyosaurs.”

Susana Gutarra concluded: “Swimming is a very complex phenomenon and there are some aspects of it that are particularly hard to test in fossil animals, like motion.

“In the future, we’ll probably see simulations of ichthyosaurs moving through water.

“At the moment, simulating the ichthyosaurs in a static gliding position, enables us to focus our study on the morphology, minimizing our assumptions about their motion and also allow us to compare a relatively large sample of models.”

Comparison of the effects of body shape, swimming style and body size on the net energy cost of steady swimming in ichthyosaurs. (a,b) Relative net cost of steady swimming (COTnet) for ichthyosaurs of the same mass moving at the same speed. (a) Differences owing to morphology, not accounting for swimming style (propulsive efficiency, η = 1). (b) Differences owing to body shape and swimming style, incorporating propulsive efficiency estimates from living aquatic vertebrates; η = 0.48 for anguilliform swimmers [31] and η = 0.81 for carangiform swimmers [28,29]. (c,d) Relative differences in the net cost of swimming owing to body shape and size (length for each taxon is the mean of multiple specimens), moving at the same speed of 1 m s−1, when swimming efficiency is not accounted for (η = 1) (c), or (d) after incorporating the propulsive efficiency as in (b). (e) Mean COTnet of ichthyosaurs at life-size scale calculated as in (d), plotted against the mean occurrence age for each taxon. Colour coding for (a–e) corresponds to the one used in figures 2 and 3.

Comparison of the effects of body shape, swimming style and body size on the net energy cost of steady swimming in ichthyosaurs. (a,b) Relative net cost of steady swimming (COTnet) for ichthyosaurs of the same mass moving at the same speed. (a) Differences owing to morphology, not accounting for swimming style (propulsive efficiency, η = 1). (b) Differences owing to body shape and swimming style, incorporating propulsive efficiency estimates from living aquatic vertebrates; η = 0.48 for anguilliform swimmers [31] and η = 0.81 for carangiform swimmers [28,29]. (c,d) Relative differences in the net cost of swimming owing to body shape and size (length for each taxon is the mean of multiple specimens), moving at the same speed of 1 m s−1, when swimming efficiency is not accounted for (η = 1) (c), or (d) after incorporating the propulsive efficiency as in (b). (e) Mean COTnet of ichthyosaurs at life-size scale calculated as in (d), plotted against the mean occurrence age for each taxon. Colour coding for (a–e) corresponds to the one used in figures 2 and 3.

This research was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council, UK.

Journal Reference:Susana Gutarra, Benjamin C. Moon, Imran A. Rahman, Colin Palmer, Stephan Lautenschlager, Alison J. Brimacombe, Michael J. Benton. Effects of body plan evolution on the hydrodynamic drag and energy requirements of swimming in ichthyosaurs. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 2019; 286 (1898): 20182786 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2018.2786

University of Bristol. “Scientists put ichthyosaurs in virtual water tanks.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 6 March 2019. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/03/190306081714.htm>.
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WFS News: Origins of giant extinct New Zealand bird adzebill traced to Africa

March 2nd, 2019 Riffin

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Adzebill skeleton on display in the Canterbury Museum, New Zealand. Among the giant bird's closest living relatives are the tiny flufftails from Madagascar and Africa. Credit: Canterbury Museum

Adzebill skeleton on display in the Canterbury Museum, New Zealand. Among the giant bird’s closest living relatives are the tiny flufftails from Madagascar and Africa.Credit: Canterbury Museum

Scientists have revealed the African origins of New Zealand’s most mysterious giant flightless bird — the now extinct adzebill — showing that some of its closest living relatives are the pint-sized flufftails from Madagascar and Africa.

Led by the University of Adelaide, the research in the journal Diversity showed that among the closest living relatives of the New Zealand adzebills — which weighed up to 19 kilograms — are the tiny flufftails, which can weigh as little as 25 grams. The closeness of the relationship strongly suggests that the ancestors of the adzebills flew to New Zealand after it became physically isolated from other land.

This finding mirrors the close relationship between New Zealand’s kiwi and the extinct Madagascan elephant birds, published by University of Adelaide researchers in 2014, hinting at an unappreciated biological connection between Madagascar and New Zealand.

Like the better-known moa, the two species of adzebill — the North Island adzebill and South Island adzebill -disappeared following the arrival of early Maori in New Zealand, who hunted them and cleared their forest habitats. Unlike the moa, adzebills were predators and not herbivores.

“The adzebill were almost completely wingless and had an enormous reinforced skull and beak, almost like an axe, which is where they got their English name,” says Alexander Boast, lead author and former Masters student at the University of Adelaide.

“If they hadn’t gone extinct, they would be among the largest living birds.”

A team of researchers from Australia, New Zealand, and the US analysed genetic data from the two adzebill species.

“A lot of past genetic research and publicity has focused on the moa, which we know were distant relatives of the ostrich, emu, and cassowary,” says co-author Dr Kieren Mitchell, postdoctoral researcher at the University of Adelaide.

“But noone had analysed the genetics of the adzebill, despite a lot of debate about exactly what they were and where they came from.”

“We know that adzebills have been in New Zealand for a relatively long time, since we previously discovered a 19 million-year-old adzebill fossil on the South Island,” says co-author Associate Professor Trevor Worthy, a palaeontologist at Flinders University.

“A key question is whether they’ve been present since New Zealand broke away from the other fragments of the supercontinent Gondwana or whether their ancestors flew to New Zealand from elsewhere later on.”

Researchers at both the University of Adelaide’s Australian Centre for Ancient DNA and Curtin University’s Ancient DNA Lab sequenced adzebill DNA from fragments of bone and eggshell. They compared this to DNA from living birds to discover the identity and origin of the adzebill.

“It’s possible that ancient migration of birds between Madagascar and New Zealand may have occurred via Antarctica,” says Dr Mitchell.

“Some coastal regions of the continent remained forested and ice free until as recently as 30 million years ago.”

Dr Paul Scofield, Senior Curator Natural History at Canterbury Museum says: “The North Island adzebill likely evolved from its South Island counterpart relatively recently. We know the North and South Islands were joined by a narrow piece of land around two million years ago. Adzebills probably developed in the South Island, then walked over this land bridge to the North Island.”

  1. alexander P. Boast, Brendan Chapman , Michael B. Herrera, Trevor H. Worthy, R. Paul Scofield, Alan J. D. Tennyson, Peter Houde, Michael Bunce, Alan Cooper and Kieren J. Mitchell. Mitochondrial Genomes from New Zealand’s Extinct Adzebills (Aves: Aptornithidae: Aptornis) Support a Sister-Taxon Relationship with the Afro-Madagascan Sarothruridae. Diversity, 2019 DOI: 10.3390/d11020024  
University of Adelaide. “Origins of giant extinct New Zealand bird traced to Africa.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 21 February 2019. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190221110359.htm>.
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WFS News: Prehistoric worms populated the sea bed 500 million years ago

March 1st, 2019 Riffin

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Prehistoric worms populated the sea bed 500 million years ago — evidence that life was active in an environment thought uninhabitable until now, research by the University of Saskatchewan (USask) shows.

The sea bed in the deep ocean during the Cambrian period was thought to have been inhospitable to animal life because it lacked enough oxygen to sustain it.

But research published in the scientific journal Geology reveals the existence of fossilized worm tunnels dating back to the Cambrian period — 270 million years before the evolution of dinosaurs.

These are worm tunnels (labelled) visible in small section of rock. Credit: Professor Brian Pratt, University of Saskatchewan

These are worm tunnels (labelled) visible in small section of rock.
Credit: Professor Brian Pratt, University of Saskatchewan

The discovery, by USask professor Brian Pratt, suggests that animal life in the sediment at that time was more widespread than previously thought.

The worm tunnels — borrows where worms lived and munched through the sediment — are invisible to the naked eye. But Pratt “had a hunch” and sliced the rocks and scanned them to see whether they revealed signs of ancient life.

The rocks came from an area in the remote Mackenzie Mountains of the Northwest Territories in Canada which Pratt found 35 years ago.

Pratt then digitally enhanced images of the rock surfaces so he could examine them more closely. Only then did the hidden ‘superhighway’ of burrows made by several different sizes and types of prehistoric worm emerge in the rock.

Some were barely a millimetre in size and others as large as a finger. The smaller ones were probably made by simple polychaetes — or bristle worms — but one of the large forms was a predator that attacked unsuspecting arthropods and surface-dwelling worms.

Pratt said he was “surprised” by the unexpected discovery.

“For the first time, we saw evidence of large populations of worms living in the sediment — which was thought to be barren,” he said. “There were cryptic worm tunnels — burrows — in the mud on the continental shelf 500 million years ago, and more animals reworking, or bioturbating, the sea bed than anyone ever thought.”

Pratt, a geologist and paleontologist and Fellow of the Geological Society of America, found the tunnels in sedimentary rocks that are similar to the Burgess Shale, a famous fossil-bearing deposit in the Canadian Rockies.

The discovery may prompt a rethink of the level of oxygenation in ancient oceans and continental shelves.

The Cambrian period saw an explosion of life on Earth in the oceans and the development of multi-cellular organisms including prehistoric worms, clams, snails and ancestors of crabs and lobsters. Previously the seas had been inhabited by simple, single-celled microbes and algae.

It has always been assumed that the creatures in the Burgess Shale — known for the richness of its fossils — had been preserved so immaculately because the lack of oxygen at the bottom of the sea stopped decay, and because no animals lived in the mud to eat the carcasses.

Pratt’s discovery, with co-author Julien Kimmig, now of the University of Kansas, shows there was enough oxygen to sustain various kinds of worms in the sea bed.

“Serendipity is a common aspect to my kind of research,” Pratt said. “I found these unusual rocks quite by accident all those years ago. On a hunch I prepared a bunch of samples and when I enhanced the images I was genuinely surprised by what I found,” he said.

“This has a lot of implications which will now need to be investigated, not just in Cambrian shales but in younger rocks as well. People should try the same technique to see if it reveals signs of life in their samples.”

The research was funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

  1. Brian R. Pratt, Julien Kimmig. Extensive bioturbation in a middle Cambrian Burgess Shale–type fossil Lagerstätte in northwestern Canada. Geology, 2019; 47 (3): 231 DOI: 10.1130/G45551.1

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Source: www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190228113640.htm

WFS News:Plant leaf tooth feature extraction

February 24th, 2019 Riffin

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Plant leaf tooth feature extraction

Citation: Wang H, Tian D, Li C, Tian Y, Zhou H (2019) Plant leaf tooth feature extraction. PLoS ONE 14(2): e0204714. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0204714

Editor: Yi Jiang, Georgia State University, UNITED STATES

The eight types of leaves. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0204714.g004

The eight types of leaves.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0204714.g004

Leaf tooth can indicate several systematically informative features and is extremely useful for circumscribing fossil leaf taxa. Moreover, it can help discriminate species or even higher taxa accurately. Previous studies extract features that are not strictly defined in botany; therefore, a uniform standard to compare the accuracies of various feature extraction methods cannot be used. For efficient and automatic retrieval of plant leaves from a leaf database, in this study, we propose an image-based description and measurement of leaf teeth by referring to the leaf structure classification system in botany. First, image preprocessing is carried out to obtain a binary map of plant leaves. Then, corner detection based on the curvature scale-space (CSS) algorithm is used to extract the inflection point from the edges; next, the leaf tooth apex is extracted by screening the convex points; then, according to the definition of the leaf structure, the characteristics of the leaf teeth are described and measured in terms of number of orders of teeth, tooth spacing, number of teeth, sinus shape, and tooth shape. In this manner, data extracted from the algorithm can not only be used to classify plants, but also provide scientific and standardized data to understand the history of plant evolution. Finally, to verify the effectiveness of the extraction method, we used simple linear discriminant analysis and multiclass support vector machine to classify leaves. The results show that the proposed method achieves high accuracy that is superior to that of other methods.

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WFS News: Tiny tyrannosaur fossil discovery changes the dinosaur timeline

February 21st, 2019 Riffin

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Tyrannosaurus rex wasn’t always the king of the dinosaurs. Before they became towering predators, tyrannosaurs started out much smaller, and a newly discovered fossil is helping fill the gap between those two extremes.

The fossil findings are detailed in a study published Thursday in Communications Biology.
The dinosaur fossil was found in Utah, where it lived 96 million years ago in a lush delta during the Cretaceous period. It’s been named Moros intrepidus, which means “harbinger of doom.” The dinosaur lived at the end of the allosaurs’ reign at the top of the food chain and before Tyrannosaurus rex arrived.
It’s now the oldest tyrannosaur from the Cretaceous period found in North America.
Medium-size tyrannosaur fossils have been found from the Jurassic period, about 150 million years ago. And then, about 81 million years ago during the Cretaceous, tyrannosaurs grew into giant predators and replaced allosaurs as the top of the food chain.
So what happened in between? Moros is helping researchers fill that 70 million-year gap, as well as provide a portrait of tyrannosaur lineage in North America. Moros links the earliest, smaller tyrannosaurs to Tyrannosaurus rex.
“With a lethal combination of bone-crunching bite forces, stereoscopic vision, rapid growth rates, and colossal size, tyrant dinosaurs reigned uncontested for 15 million years leading up to the end-Cretaceous extinction — but it wasn’t always that way,” said Lindsay Zanno, lead study author and paleontologist at North Carolina State University, in a statement. “When and how quickly tyrannosaurs went from wallflower to prom king has been vexing paleontologists for a long time. The only way to attack this problem was to get out there and find more data on these rare animals.”
Zanno and her team spent a decade searching for fossils from the Late Cretaceous period. They recovered teeth and a hind limb consisting of a femur, a tibia and parts of a foot belonging to Moros in the same area where Zanno found the fossil of a giant carnivorous carcharodontosaur.
But Moros stood between 3 and 4 feet tall. The dinosaur they found was 7 years old when it died, a nearly full-grown adult that would have weighed around 172 pounds. The elongated leg and foot bones indicated that it would be a great runner.
“Moros was lightweight and exceptionally fast,” Zanno said. “These adaptations, together with advanced sensory capabilities, are the mark of a formidable predator. It could easily have run down prey, while avoiding confrontation with the top predators of the day.”
This allowed Moros to be a survivor as the environment shifted and changed. For 15 million years, tyrannosaurs were restricted to this smaller size before evolving into giants (about 12 feet tall and 11,000 to 15,500 pounds) over a 16 million-year period.
“Although the earliest Cretaceous tyrannosaurs were small, their predatory specializations meant that they were primed to take advantage of new opportunities when warming temperatures, rising sea-level and shrinking ranges restructured ecosystems at the beginning of the Late Cretaceous,” Zanno said. “We now know it took them less than 15 million years to rise to power.”
Moros is most closely related to tyrannosaurs from Asia, which helped the researchers trace the dinosaurs’ lineage. This means Moros crossed the Alaskan land bridge during the Early Cretaceous to reach North America.
“T. rex and its famous contemporaries such as Triceratops may be among our most beloved cultural icons, but we owe their existence to their intrepid ancestors who migrated here from Asia at least 30 million years prior,” Zanno said. “Moros signals the establishment of the iconic Late Cretaceous ecosystems of North America.”
Source: Article By Ashley Strickland, CNN
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WFS News: 2.1-Billion-Year-Old Fossil May Be Evidence of Earliest Moving Life-Form

February 12th, 2019 Riffin

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About 2.1 billion years ago, a blob-like creature inched along on an early Earth. As the organism moved, it carved out tunnels, which may be the earliest evidence of a moving critter on the planet.

Until this discovery, the earliest evidence of motility — that is, an organism’s ability to move independently using its own metabolic energy — dated to about 570 million years ago, according to fossils from different locations. That’s a good 1.5 billion years younger than the new finding.

Whatever left the teeny, tiny tunnels was likely a cluster of single cells that joined ranks to form a slug-like multicellular organism, the researchers said. And perhaps, this sluggy conglomerate tunneled through the mud in search of greener pastures or food to gobble up, the international team of scientists said. [In Images: The Oldest Fossils on Earth]

However, not everyone agrees that these tunnels were made by complex life, and one researcher, who was not affiliated with the study, called the claims “imprecise.”

Tunneling life?

The researchers found the trace fossils in Gabon, along Africa’s west coast. A trace fossil is a fossil that was not part of an organism’s body that it leaves behind, such as a footprint, a burrow or even poop. In this case, the trace fossils are a series of slender tunnels that were made in what was once called the Francevillian inland sea — an oxygenated and shallow marine environment that existed during the Paleoproterozoic, an eralasting from about 2.5 billion to 1.6 billion years ago.

Until now, the oldest traces of motility (an organism’s ability to move independently using metabolic energy) dated to about 600 million years ago. But now, newly analyzed fossils suggest that motility dates back to 2.1 billion years ago. (Scale bar: 1 centimeter, or 0.4 inches.) Credit: A. El Albani/IC2MP/CNRS – Université de Poitiers

After collecting hundreds of specimens from the ancient inland sea, the scientists in the recent study found fossilized tunnels. These structures indicated that some ancient multicellular organisms were complex enough to scoot through the mud, said first author Abderrazak El Albani, a professor of paleobiology and geochemistry at IC2MP, an institute of the University of Poitiers and the the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in France.

There is a modern analogue to this weird slug-like creature. During times of starvation, some cellular slime molds aggregate together in what is called a “migratory slug phase,” so they can look for food together, El Albani said.

The tunnels these ancient critters left behind are small, with a diameter of up to 2.3 inches (6 centimeters) and a length of up to 6.7 inches (17 cm). What’s more, the tunnels appear to be made by something that moved laterally and vertically through the muck, El Albani told Live Science. To determine for sure that these tunnels were left by living creatures, the researchers analyzed the structures in several ways. For starters, the scientists used an X-ray computed microtomography (micro-CT) scan to analyze the specimen in 3D (see the above video).

The team also analyzed the chemical components in the trace fossils, finding that these traces were biological in origin and also matched the age of the 2.1-billion-year-old sediment around them. Moreover, the tunnels were next to fossilized microbial mats, known as biofilms. Perhaps the strange, slug-like beast grazed on these microbial “carpets,” the researchers said.

The tubes in the sample are filled with pyrite crystals, which are generated by the transformation by bacteria of biological tissue. The parallel horizontal layers are fossilized microbial mats.Credit: Copyright A. El Albani & A. Mazurier/IC2MP/CNRS – Université de Poitiers

While much about this critter remains a mystery, its existence raises new questions about the history of life, El Abani said. Was this the first time a complex organism moved, and was movement perfected later on? Or was this creature’s experiment cut short when atmospheric oxygen levels dropped drastically about 2 billion years ago, only for this kind of movement to resurface much later? [7 Theories on the Origin of Life]

But not everyone thinks these tunnels represent the oldest proof of motility.

“The claim sounds really imprecise,” Tanja Bosak, an associate professor of geobiology in the Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told Live Science in an email. “Perhaps they are referring to something macroscopic moving — there are much older rocks (stromatolites) with shapes and textures that require the former presence of motile microbes.”

She emphasized that while she didn’t have time for an in-depth reading of the study, Bosak told Live Science, “I hope that they discuss this somewhere and tone down the splashy claims at least a little.”

The study was published online yesterday (Feb. 11) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Source: Article By Laura Geggel, Senior Writer , www.livescience.com

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WFS News: Ancient Passerines Fossils reveals Oldest Finch-Beaked Birds

February 11th, 2019 Riffin

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A 52-million-year fossil of a “perching bird” has been found in Wyoming with its feathers still attached, a discovery that “no one’s ever seen before.”

Also known as passerines, the perching bird was discovered in Fossil Lake, WY. Passerines are well-known for eating seeds, as most modern-day birds do and account for approximately 65 percent of the 10,000 different species of birds alive today.

 

 

Figure 1Morphology of Eofringillirostrum (A) Photograph and (B) line drawing of the holotype skeleton of Eofringillirostrum boudreauxi (FMNH PA 793) with enlargements showing details of the (C) skull and (D) foot, and (E) line drawing of foot. (F) Holotype slab (IRSNB Av 128a) and (G) counterslab (IRSNB Av 128b) of Eofringillirostrum parvulum with enlargements showing details of (H) skull and (I) carpometacarpus; for contrast enhancement, the specimen was coated with ammonium chloride. Abbreviations: at: accessory trochlea, br: base of the main body of fourth metatarsal trochlea (articular end broken off); d-I – d-IV: pedal digits I – IV, dvf: distal vascular foramen, ext: extensor process, int: intermetacarpal process, ot: ossified tendon, py: pygostyle, rp: retroarticular process, sup: dorsal supracondylar process, tr: tracheal rings. Arrows in (D) indicate borders of intermetacarpal process. Grey shaded regions in (B) indicate portions of the carpometacarpus that were displaced during splitting of the slab. See also Figure S2.

Figure 1Morphology of Eofringillirostrum
(A) Photograph and (B) line drawing of the holotype skeleton of Eofringillirostrum boudreauxi (FMNH PA 793) with enlargements showing details of the (C) skull and (D) foot, and (E) line drawing of foot. (F) Holotype slab (IRSNB Av 128a) and (G) counterslab (IRSNB Av 128b) of Eofringillirostrum parvulum with enlargements showing details of (H) skull and (I) carpometacarpus; for contrast enhancement, the specimen was coated with ammonium chloride. Abbreviations: at: accessory trochlea, br: base of the main body of fourth metatarsal trochlea (articular end broken off); d-I – d-IV: pedal digits I – IV, dvf: distal vascular foramen, ext: extensor process, int: intermetacarpal process, ot: ossified tendon, py: pygostyle, rp: retroarticular process, sup: dorsal supracondylar process, tr: tracheal rings. Arrows in (D) indicate borders of intermetacarpal process. Grey shaded regions in (B) indicate portions of the carpometacarpus that were displaced during splitting of the slab. See also Figure S2.

FIRST DINOSAUR FEATHER EVER DISCOVERED REVEALS MYSTERIOUS SECRETS

The study has been published in the scientific journal Current Biology.

Now known as Eofringillirostrum boudreauxi, the bird had a “finch-like beak,” similar to modern day finches and sparrows, which could give clues as to its diet.

Figure 2Phylogenetic Relationships of Early Passerines Strict consensus of 394 most parsimonious trees (707 steps, RC = 0.174, RI = 0.626) based on analysis of 146 morphological characters enforcing the backbone constraint and divergence dates from [20]. Bootstrap support values are shown above the branches they pertain to, though note nodes that are constrained may receive artificially high support (e.g., Psittaciformes). Character list, scorings, and additional details of analyses are provided in the Supplemental Information and Figure S3.

Figure 2Phylogenetic Relationships of Early Passerines
Strict consensus of 394 most parsimonious trees (707 steps, RC = 0.174, RI = 0.626) based on analysis of 146 morphological characters enforcing the backbone constraint and divergence dates from [20]. Bootstrap support values are shown above the branches they pertain to, though note nodes that are constrained may receive artificially high support (e.g., Psittaciformes). Character list, scorings, and additional details of analyses are provided in the Supplemental Information and Figure S3.

“These bills are particularly well-suited for consuming small, hard seeds,” Daniel Ksepka, the paper’s lead author, curator at the Bruce Museum in Connecticut, said in the statement.

“The earliest birds probably ate insects and fish, some may have been eating small lizards,” Grande added. “Until this discovery, we did not know much about the ecology of early passerines. E. boudreauxi gives us an important look at this.”

Stem and Crown Passerines (A–P) Images and comparative line drawings of the skull in (A–H) Eocene stem passerines and photographs of the head and line drawings of the skull in (I–P) crown passerines with a similar bill shape. Fossil taxa: (A and B) Morsoravis sp. (FMNH PA789), (C and D) Eofringillirostrum boudreauxi (FMNH PA 793), (E and F) Pumiliornis tessellatus (SMF-ME 11414a) and (G and H) Psittacopes lepidus (SMF-ME 1279). Extant taxa: (I and J) Catharus guttatus (Hermit Thrush, Turdidae), (K and L) Spinus tristis (American Goldfinch, Fringillidae), (M and N) Aethopyga saturata (Black-throated Sunbird, Nectariniidae) and (O and P) Panurus biarmicus (Bearded Reedling, Panuridae). Photo credits and sources for line drawings are provided in the Supplemental Information. Not to scale.

Stem and Crown Passerines
(A–P) Images and comparative line drawings of the skull in (A–H) Eocene stem passerines and photographs of the head and line drawings of the skull in (I–P) crown passerines with a similar bill shape. Fossil taxa: (A and B) Morsoravis sp. (FMNH PA789), (C and D) Eofringillirostrum boudreauxi (FMNH PA 793), (E and F) Pumiliornis tessellatus (SMF-ME 11414a) and (G and H) Psittacopes lepidus (SMF-ME 1279). Extant taxa: (I and J) Catharus guttatus (Hermit Thrush, Turdidae), (K and L) Spinus tristis (American Goldfinch, Fringillidae), (M and N) Aethopyga saturata (Black-throated Sunbird, Nectariniidae) and (O and P) Panurus biarmicus (Bearded Reedling, Panuridae). Photo credits and sources for line drawings are provided in the Supplemental Information. Not to scale.

Fossil Lake has been home to several discoveries of past species, including birds, reptiles and early mammals, due in large part to what has been described as “perfect conditions.”

“We have spent so much time excavating this locality, that we have a record of even the very rare things,” Grande said.

TRIASSIC ‘LIZARD KING’ RULED ANTARCTICA BEFORE THE DINOSAUR

Fossil Lake provides a rare look into a world after the dinosaurs went extinct, but before mammals really started to take off and become the dominant form of life on Earth.

“I’ve been going to Fossil Lake every year for the last 35 years, and finding this bird is one of the reasons I keep going back. It’s so rich,” Grande added. “We keep finding things that no one’s ever seen before.”

Sources:Current Biology and Fox news

@WFS,World Fossil Society,Riffin T Sajeev,Russel T Sajeev

 

WFS News: kangaroo fossil reveals origin of marsupial hop

February 6th, 2019 Riffin

@WFS,World Fossil Society,Riffin T Sajeev,Russel T Sajeev

Artistic reconstruction showing the balbarid kangaroo relative Nambaroo gillespieae (top left) ( Peter Shouten/Australian Geographic )

Artistic reconstruction showing the balbarid kangaroo relative Nambaroo gillespieae (top left)                                                                         ( Peter Shouten/Australian Geographic )Fossils unearthed in the Australian bush have provided new insights into how the kangaroo got its hop.

The 20-million-year-old remains belong to a long-extinct species of kangaroo relative that not only hopped but also bounded along on all fours as well as climbed.

Known as balbarids, these creatures reveal how the distinctive anatomy of these marsupials allowed them to conquer an entire continent.

The origin of the kangaroo’s distinctive method of getting around has been shrouded in mystery, as ancient skeletons belonging to their ancestors are rare.

“The long held idea is that the kangaroo hop evolved in response to climate change, with the spread of arid grasslands opening up new habitats that selected for high speed hopping gaits,” Dr Benjamin Kear, a palaeontologist at Uppsala University told The Independent.

While some other animals, including the hopping mouse, have adopted a similar gait, kangaroos have unique anatomy to facilitate this highly efficient mode of locomotion.

To find out if the same was true of balbarids, Dr Kear and his colleagues analysed the few bones they had unearthed belonging to one known as Nambaroo gillespieae, comparing them to different modern relatives that live in trees and on the plains.

Their results, published in the journal Royal Society Open Science, challenged the idea that kangaroos began hopping on Australia’s arid plains.

The scientists said these creatures appear to have evolved a versatile anatomy to scramble around their forest environment.

“The iconic kangaroo body plan is therefore extremely adaptable, and was probably a key to their success over the last 20 million years or more,” said Dr Kear.

It was not enough to save the balbarids, however, and the team think these creatures were probably driven to extinction as their forest homes shrunk.

“On the other hand, the ancestors of modern kangaroos used the same suite of locomotory morphologies to exploit newly emerging open habitats, and thus gave rise to one of the most successful mammal radiations on the Australian landmass today,” said Dr Kear.

Source: Article by  Josh Gabbatiss,Science Correspondent,Independent.

@WFS,World Fossil Society,Riffin T Sajeev,Russel T Sajeev

WFS News: Detection of lost calamus challenges identity of isolated Archaeopteryx feather

February 5th, 2019 Riffin

@WFS,World Fossil Society, Riffin T Sajeev,Russel T Sajeev

Abstract

Scientific Reports  9, Article number: 1182 (2019)

In 1862, a fossil feather from the Solnhofen quarries was described as the holotype of the iconic Archaeopteryx lithographica. The isolated feather’s identification has been problematic, and the fossil was considered either a primary, secondary or, most recently, a primary covert. The specimen is surrounded by the ‘mystery of the missing quill’. The calamus described in the original paper is unseen today, even under x-ray fluorescence and UV imaging, challenging its original existence. We answer this question using Laser-Stimulated Fluorescence (LSF) through the recovery of the geochemical halo from the original calamus matching the published description. Our study therefore shows that new techniques applied to well-studied iconic fossils can still provide valuable insights. The morphology of the complete feather excludes it as a primary, secondary or tail feather of Archaeopteryx. However, it could be a covert or a contour feather, especially since the latter are not well known in Archaeopteryx. The possibility remains that it stems from a different feathered dinosaur that lived in the Solnhofen Archipelago. The most recent analysis of the isolated feather considers it to be a primary covert. If this is the case, it lacks a distinct s-shaped centerline found in modern primary coverts that appears to be documented here for the first time.

Introduction

Arguably one of the best known and most iconic of fossil vertebrates, specimens of the “urvogel” Archaeopteryx have been found for more than a century in the Solnhofen limestones of Southern Germany1. As the first feather fossil ever discovered1,2, the isolated feather long rivaled the London specimen as the holotype of Archaeopteryx lithographica, before the latter was eventually designated as a neotype3. This fossil is represented by two slabs, which are in the collections of museums in Berlin and Munich, respectively. The known specimens of Archaeopteryx (11 or 12: the urvogel identity of one specimen has recently been challenged4,5) include some with feathers preserved as limestone impressions. This is contrasted by the isolated feather, which has a dark coloration and preserves as a film of carbon6,7,8,9,10,11 or manganese dioxide1. Most notably, the specimen has been characterized by the mystery of the “missing quill” – the originally reported calamus is today invisible in the fossil10.

Previous analyses of the isolated feather have been controversial, with disparate identifications as a primary (possibly a remicle of a larger specimen7; distal primary12), secondary1,7 (found as a distal secondary when compared to Columba and Pica7) and primary covert8. The lack of a preserved calamus added to the difficulty of the task. The calamus was first described and drawn in 18622, but no obvious evidence of it remains today10 (Fig. 1). Possible explanations for the lack of a visible calamus on the more complete Berlin slab could be from damage incurred during past cleaning, re-preparation or handling of the slab (finger contact e.g. Fig. S2) as well as repeated exposure to daylight. However, there is no definitive evidence that attributes such damage to these particular sources. X-ray fluorescence13 and UV imaging studies of the feather did not report the missing quill (Figs 5, 6 of Plate 9 and Figs 1,2 of Plate 10 in14; Fig. 5.8 of1).

The isolated Archaeopteryx feather, Berlin specimen MB.Av.100. (A) As it looks today under white light (see Plates 1 & 5 [Fig. 1] of7, Fig. 1A of8 and Plate 10 of14). (B) Original drawing from 1862 by von Meyer2. (C) Laser-Stimulated Fluorescence (LSF) showing the halo of the missing calamus (negative image). See Fig. S2 for additional images of the main slab, specimen BSP 1869 VIII 1 (‘Munich slab’). Scale bar 1 cm.

The isolated Archaeopteryx feather, Berlin specimen MB.Av.100. (A) As it looks today under white light (see Plates 1 & 5 [Fig. 1] of7, Fig. 1A of8 and Plate 10 of14). (B) Original drawing from 1862 by von Meyer2. (C) Laser-Stimulated Fluorescence (LSF) showing the halo of the missing calamus (negative image). See Fig. S2 for additional images of the main slab, specimen BSP 1869 VIII 1 (‘Munich slab’). Scale bar 1 cm.

During an examination of the Berlin slab, a geochemical halo of the missing calamus was recovered for the first time using Laser-Stimulated Fluorescence (Fig. 1). This technique uses a high power laser to reveal geochemical differences in the specimen and matrix which fluoresce with different colors15,16,17 (see Materials and Methods). The length and width of the calamus halo matches that of the original published description2 (Fig. 1). Microscopic examination revealed past preparation had engraved around the outline of the feather and inadvertently prepared away the calamus at some unknown point in the past. Thus, the recovered geochemical halo is a chemical breakdown residue fluorescing immediately beneath the surface of the original carbon or manganese dioxide film.The feathers are clearly defined in many Archaeopteryx skeletons1. The feather impressions from some of the more complete specimens allows for detailed morphologic measurements1,18. The general morphology of Archaeopteryx feathers is considered similar to modern birds, allowing cautious comparisons with living taxa1.

As in extant birds, the primaries of Archaeopteryx are characteristically straight and have vane asymmetry19. Their straightness does not match the isolated feather and they are also generally more asymmetrically vaned. The isolated feather’s identification as a primary feather has also been historically argued against1,7. Archaeopteryx lacks a bastard wing (alula)1, so the identification of the isolated feather as an alula feather of Archaeopteryx can be excluded.

The isolated feather is also not a tail feather (rectrix) of Archaeopteryx. The distal rectrices of Archaeopteryx are extremely long and symmetrical in outline at the tip (eleventh specimen: Fig. 2E of18), two features absent in the isolated feather. The isolated feather shares a general asymmetry in outline and rachis position with the lateral rectrices, but the curvature of the rachis is too severe in the isolated feather to form the frond pattern seen in Archaeopteryx (eleventh specimen: Fig. 2F of18). The tail feathers of the London specimen lack asymmetrical vanes, which also contrasts with the morphology of the isolated feather1.

The secondary feathers in the known Archaeopteryx specimens are the closest matches to the general feather outline of the isolated feather. Unfortunately, no other feathers stand alone in other Archaeopteryxspecimens with feather preservation, but measurements of the isolated feather can be compared to the secondaries of the Berlin specimen, which preserves the most complete wing feathering of Archaeopteryx1,14. The outline of the isolated feather was superimposed onto a version scaled to match the width of the most similar secondary feather in the Berlin specimen (Fig. 2). This comparison reveals that the isolated feather is 1/3 shorter than required to scale to the secondaries of the Berlin Archaeopteryx wing. Unfortunately, the specimens larger than the Berlin specimen (London and Solnhofen) as well as the smallest urvogel (Eichstätt) both have poorly preserved feathering1, so this cannot be compared across ontogeny.

A range of secondary feather counts has previously been reconstructed along the ulna of the Berlin specimen (ten20, twelve21, fourteen (Fig. 6.18 of1) and twelve to fifteen22), but the reliability of these counts has been questioned18. Scaling the isolated feather to match the length and spatial overlap in the wing of the Berlin specimen (Fig. S7) shows that 7 secondaries could fit along the wing, significantly fewer feathers than past reconstructions. If the isolated feather was from a subadult as suggested by Wellnhofer1, then the feather count on the shorter ulna would be even less. As mentioned, this cannot be compared across ontogeny as the largest and smallest Archaeopteryx specimens (Solnhofen and Eichstätt) have poorly preserved feathering1. Nevertheless, these data raise questions about the fit of the isolated feather to the wing of Archaeopteryx.

The remaining possibilities for the isolated feather are as a covert or a contour feather. However, a determination is less straightforward. Little is known about the contour feathers of Archaeopteryx, although modern contour feathers typically have less robust calami than the isolated feather. As a covert, the isolated feather is very different to those of extant birds. In living birds, the secondary coverts attach to the calamus of the secondary flight feathers at an angle (Fig. S8). This configuration necessitates a shorter calamus than the primary coverts, which are in place alongside the primary feather calamus. The robust calamus of the isolated feather is therefore too large for a secondary covert, so this identification is not supported. The most recent analysis of the isolated feather considered it to be a primary covert8. The size-normalized calamus-rachis centerlines of primary coverts from 24 modern birds, including those of different body sizes, were compared to the isolated feather (Fig. 3). All possess a calamus-rachis centerline that curves towards the leading edge of the wing from the centerline of the calamus, unlike the rachis centerlines of the other feather types present in the same wing specimens7,19,23,24 (Figs 3, S3–S6). This ‘S-shaped’ centerline described here for the first time, appears to be a defining characteristic of primary coverts across a very broad range of modern species, including the palaeognath tinamou. In contrast, the centerline of the isolated Solnhofen feather curves strongly toward the wing’s trailing edge (see blue line in Fig. 3) so does not match the morphology of primary coverts in modern birds7,19,23,24.

Overlay of the isolated feather MB.Av.100 scaled to the same size as the most similar secondary feather in the wing of the Berlin Archaeopteryx MB.Av.101. Significant foreshortening of the isolated feather does not support its association with Archaeopteryx.

Overlay of the isolated feather MB.Av.100 scaled to the same size as the most similar secondary feather in the wing of the Berlin Archaeopteryx MB.Av.101. Significant foreshortening of the isolated feather does not support its association with Archaeopteryx.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Size-normalized centerline calamus-rachis traces for the primary coverts of 24 modern birds compared to the trace of the isolated feather (Berlin specimen, MB.Av.100). The blue line is the isolated feather’s trace whilst the orange line is from the common magpie (Pica pica, Fig. S3) whose wing has been cited as the isolated feather’s closest modern match1,7. In brown is the centerline trace from a modern Undulated Tinamou (Crypturellus undulatus UWBM 71526, Fig. S4), which belongs to the only groups of extant palaeognaths with flight capabilities. The yellow zone represents the area covered by the traces of all 24 measured feathers, including a 1.5% error zone allowing for taphonomic flex (see Fig. S1). In all cases the isolated feathers centerline is a large departure from modern primary coverts.

Size-normalized centerline calamus-rachis traces for the primary coverts of 24 modern birds compared to the trace of the isolated feather (Berlin specimen, MB.Av.100). The blue line is the isolated feather’s trace whilst the orange line is from the common magpie (Pica pica, Fig. S3) whose wing has been cited as the isolated feather’s closest modern match1,7. In brown is the centerline trace from a modern Undulated Tinamou (Crypturellus undulatus UWBM 71526, Fig. S4), which belongs to the only groups of extant palaeognaths with flight capabilities. The yellow zone represents the area covered by the traces of all 24 measured feathers, including a 1.5% error zone allowing for taphonomic flex (see Fig. S1). In all cases the isolated feathers centerline is a large departure from modern primary coverts.

In summary, the isolated feather is not conformal to known Archaeopteryx specimens as a primary, secondary or tail feather. Its preservation as a dark film also differentiates it from all other known specimens1,6. The isolated feather as argued here lacks any close morphological connection to the 11 or 12 known Archaeopteryxskeletons (see status of Haarlem specimen4,5), but not all feathers of Archaeopteryx are known. However, based on known feather preservation in Archaeopteryx, this study raises the possibility that the isolated feather may belong to another basal avialan or even a non-avialan pennaraptoran, increasing the low theropod diversity of the Solnhofen Archipelago1,4,25,26,27. This hypothesis would be in agreement with comments made in Opinion 2283 (Case 3390) of the ICZN Commission3 as well as the recent removal of the Haarlem specimen from Archaeopteryx4. The feather remains an enigma so we caution against the isolated feather’s association with Archaeopteryx.

Material and Methods

Archaeopteryx specimens studied

  1. 1.The single feather: BSP 1869 VIII 1 (main slab, ‘Munich slab’), Bavarian State Collection of Paleontology and Geology, Munich; MB Av.100 (counterslab, ‘Berlin slab’), Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin, Germany.
  2. 2.London specimen: NHMUK 37001 (main slab), Natural History Museum, London, UK.
  3. 3.Berlin specimen: MB.Av.101 (main and counterslab), Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin, Germany.
  4. 4.Haarlem specimen: TM 6928 (main slab), Teylers Museum, Haarlem, Netherlands; TM 6929 (counterslab).
  5. 5.Eichstätt specimen: JM 2257 (main and counterslab), Jura Museum, Willibaldsburg, Germany.
  6. 6.Solnhofen specimen: BMMS 500 (main slab), Bürgermeister Müller Museum, Solnhofen, Germany.
  7. 7.Munich specimen: BSP 1999 I 50 (main and counterslab), Bayerische Staatssammlung für Paläontologie und Geologie, Munich, Germany.
  8. 8.Daiting specimen: unknown specimen number, unknown current repository details.
  9. 9.Bürgermeister Müller (‘chicken wing’) specimen: unknown specimen number, on permanent loan to Bürgermeister Müller Museum by the families Ottmann and Steil.
  10. 10.Thermopolis specimen: WDC CSG 100 (main slab). Wyoming Dinosaur Center, Thermopolis, USA.
  11. 11.Eleventh specimen: no. 02923 on the register of cultural objects of national importance of Germany (Verzeichnis national wertvollen Kulturgutes), on long-term loan to Bürgermeister Müller Museum.

Modern bird specimens studied

Museum collections.

  1. 1.Tinamou (Crypturellus undulatus) – UWBM 71526; University of Washington Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, Seattle, USA) (Fig. S4).
  2. 2.Common magpie (Pica pica) – FSA2016-01; Foundation for Scientific Advancement, Sierra Vista, USA).Atlas of avian feathers at www.vogelfedern.de/index-e.htm.
  3. 3.Common Crane Grus grus.
  4. 4.Tundra Swan Cygnus columbianus.
  5. 5.Common Magpie Pica pica (Fig. S3).Atlas of avian feathers atwww.michelklemann.nl/verensite/start/index.html.
  6. 6.Peregrine Falcon Falco peregrinus.
  7. 7.Tufted Duck Aythya fuligula.
  8. 8.Black Headed Gull Larus ridibundus, example 1.
  9. 9.Sparrowhawk Accipiter nisus, example 5.
  10. 10.Mallard Anas platyrhynchos, example 3.
  11. 11.Swift Apus apus, example 4.
  12. 12.Little Ringed Plover Charadrius dubius.
  13. 13.Skylark Alauda arvensis.
  14. 14.Hen Harrier Circus cyaneus.
  15. 15.Long Tailed Duck Clangula hyemalis.
  16. 16.Lilac Breasted Roller Coracias caudatus.
  17. 17.Quail Coturnix coturnix.
  18. 18.Long-eared Owl Asio otus.
  19. 19.Razorbill Alca torda, example 1 (Fig. S6).
  20. 20.Teal Anas crecca, example 1.
  21. 21.Two Barred Crossbill Loxia leucoptera, example 3.
  22. 22.Giant Kingfisher Megaceryle maxima.
  23. 23.Black Kite Milvus migrans.
  24. 24.Whimberel Numenius phaeopus.
  25. 25.Eurasian Curlew Numenius arquata (Fig. S5).
  26. 26.Rook Corvus frugilegus.

Laser-Stimulated Fluorescence (LSF) imaging was performed according to the protocol of Kaye et al.15,17 so only an abbreviated version is provided here. A 405 nanometer laser diode was used to fluoresce the specimen following standard laser safety protocol. Thirty second time exposed images were taken with a Nikon D810 camera and 425 nanometer blocking filter. Post processing (equalization, saturation and colour balance) was performed in Photoshop CS6.

Primary covert feather analysis was performed from photographs. These were sourced from museum collections and the Vogel Federn and Michel Klemann online feather atlases23,24. The feathers of the latter two collections were flat bed scanned (see Supplementary Materials for discussion of flattening-related feather taphonomy). Feather centerlines were overlaid in Photoshop CS6, all centerlines were scaled to the same length.

@WFS,World Fossil Society, Riffin T Sajeev,Russel T Sajeev

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