For much of the history of paleontology, scientists thought all dinosaurs were covered in scales , just like today’s lizards. However, findings in recent decades have revealed that these extinct animals wore feathers, just as their later descendants, the birds, would.
New paleontological milestone
Now an international team of paleontologists has uncovered remarkable new evidence that pterosaurs, the flying relatives of dinosaurs, were able to control the color of their feathers using melanin pigments.
“For decades paleontologists have argued about whether pterosaurs had feathers,” explains Aude Cincotta, a researcher at University College Cork, the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences and the University of Namur. “The feathers on our specimen definitely put that debate to rest, as they are clearly branched along their length, just like birds today.”
The study, led by palaeontologists from University College Cork (UCC) and the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, as well as an international team of scientists from Brazil and Belgium, revealed that the lower part of the crest of Tupandactylus imperator had a blurred edge. feathery, with short wire-haired feathers and fluffy branching feathers.
Studying the feathers with high-power electron microscopes, they found preserved melanosomes, granules of the pigment melanin. And, to the surprise of the scientists, they discovered that the melanosomes in different types of feathers had different shapes.
“In modern birds, the color of the feathers is strongly related to the shape of the melanosomes,” explains Maria McNamara, a researcher at University College Cork.
Vibrant colored feathers!
Pterosaurs lived alongside dinosaurs during the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods, between 230 and 66 million years ago. We knew that these creatures had fluffy fur consisting of hair-like fibers called pycnofibres, but whether or not these structures were ‘true’ feathers had been a matter of debate . Until now.
“The feathers of our specimen definitely put that debate to rest, as they are very clearly branched along their length, just like birds today,” say the authors.
And what were the feathers for?
What’s more, the findings also suggest that although these feathers may not have been used for flight, they could have been used as a form of visual communication. Prehistoric flying reptiles could control their colors to attract mates or stay cool, scientists say.
“Since pterosaur feather types had different forms of melanosomes, these animals must have had the genetic machinery to control the colors of their feathers. This feature is essential for color patterning and shows that coloration was a fundamental feature.” even from the oldest feathers,” says McNamara.
According to the experts’ analysis, the feathers were most likely inherited from an avemetatarsal ancestor common to both dinosaurs and pterosaurs, although it is also possible that these characteristics evolved independently in different groups or species of animals.
Referencia: “Pterosaur melanosomes support signaling functions for early feathers” by Aude Cincotta, Michaël Nicolaï, Hebert Bruno Nascimento Campos, Maria McNamara, Liliana D’Alba, Matthew D. Shawkey, Edio-Ernst Kischlat, Johan Yans, Robert Carleer, François Escuillié and Pascal Godefroit, April 20, 2022, Nature.
DOI: 10.1038 / s41586-022-04622-3
