By Laura Geggel,
Senior Writer | December 17, 2018 02:22pm ET
There's no doubt anymore: Pterosaurs —
the flying reptiles that zipped through the skies during the dinosaur age —
sported feathers, a finding that pushes the origin of these fluffy structures
back 70 million years.
An analysis of two well-preserved
pterosaur specimens found in China revealed that these beasts had four
completely different feather types, researchers said in a study published
online today (Dec. 17) in the journal Nature Ecology &
Evolultion.
"The pterosaurs had four
types of feather-like structures: simple filaments ('hairs'), bundles of
filaments, filaments with a tuft halfway down and down feathers," study
lead researcher Baoyu Jiang, a professor of paleontology in the School of Earth
Sciences and Engineering at Nanjing University in China, told Live Science in
an email. [Photos
of Pterosaurs: Flight in the Age of Dinosaurs]
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