Feb. 4, 2013 — A new kind of pterosaur, a
flying reptile from the time of the dinosaurs, has been identified by
scientists from the Transylvanian Museum Society in Romania, the University of
Southampton in the UK and the Museau Nacional in Rio de Janiero, Brazil.
The fossilised bones come from the Late
Cretaceous rocks of Sebeş-Glod in the Transylvanian Basin, Romania, which are
approximately 68 million years old. The Transylvanian Basin is world-famous for
its many Late Cretaceous fossils, including dinosaurs of many kinds, as well as
fossilised mammals, turtles, lizards and ancient relatives of crocodiles.
A paper on the new species, named Eurazhdarcho
langendorfensis has been published in the online journal PLoS ONE. Dr
Darren Naish, from the University of Southampton's Vertebrate Palaeontology
Research Group, who helped identify the new species, says:
"Eurazhdarchobelong to a group of pterosaurs called the azhdarchids. These
were long-necked, long-beaked pterosaurs whose wings were strongly adapted for
a soaring lifestyle. Several features of their wing and hind limb bones show
that they could fold their wings up and walk on all fours when needed.
No comments:
Post a Comment