In amber found in the wings of ancient birds.
Scientists first discovered in ancient amber, the wings of birds. This was reported in the journal Nature Communications. The discovery proved that even in the middle of the Cretaceous bird feather a little than differed from modern.
Chinese paleontologist Lida Xing (Xing Lida) found two fragments of amber from Myanmar, inside which are preserved the bones, the feathers and skin of the wings. The stone has preserved claw marks: apparently, the bird tried to escape from sticky resin. Previously, on birds of the Cretaceous period, scientists recognized only by a two-dimensional prints on the stone rocks.
The structure and location of the found feathers on the wing are the same as in modern birds. Bone size was smaller than a Hummingbird, and undeveloped. All of this suggests that the wings belonged to just hatched Chicks, while enantiornithes (extinct simultaneously with the dinosaurs, toothed birds).
But the feathers are more like “uniforms” adult birds: most likely, enantiornithes were born ready for adult life, bypassing the stage of helpless Chicks.
In 2014, scientists have proposed a new explanation for the evolutionary success of birds. Gave rise to birds the theropod dinosaurs — the only branch of the dinosaurs, representatives of which over 50 million years continuously decreased in size. Becoming dwarfs in the country of giants, the ancestors of birds occupied the ecological niches and learned to climb trees, to plan and to fly. As a result, these evolutionary innovations helped the birds survive the deadly for large dinosaurs meteor cataclysm.
