Four-winged dinosaurs have relatives with birds?

What remains of the "four-winged" dinosaur, Anchiornis huxleyi, reinforces the notion that the ancestors of birds are bipedal dinosaurs that lived in the millions of years ago - the most famous fossil hunter the world said.

Xing Xu from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing affirmed his position based on the well-preserved fossil of a bird-like dinosaur named Anchiornis huxleyi.

Until now, A. huxleyi is still considered a primitive bird. It is thought to date very close to Archeopteryx, the first bird that lived about 150 million years ago.
However, these ideas are based on an incomplete fossil.

This new and nearly intact specimen offers another look, suggesting that A. huxleyi dates back millions of years to Archeopteryx, and that both species have the characteristics of both dinosaurs and flying creatures. .

Xu believes that this is a long-standing evidence from the scientific world to prove that birds with ancestors were theropod dinosaurs.

In the British journal Nature, his team published his work, which depicts a dinosaur with long feathers covering its wings, tail and legs.

Based on that, Xu assumed it was a 'four-winged' animal even though there was no guarantee that the creature could fly. In contrast, the long and slender hind legs suggest that it can run quite well.

In 2007, fossil bone fragments of a giant theropod dinosaur were displayed in Beijing. What remains of the "four-winged" dinosaur, Anchiornis huxleyi, reinforces the notion that the ancestors of birds are bipedal dinosaurs that lived in the millions of years ago - the most famous fossil hunter the world said. (Photo: Physorg.com)

Several evolutionary biologists think that the 'four wings' play an important role in the origin of hovering . However, this view was opposed by many people.

The attached coat is especially important because it shows how the bird-like dinosaur develops bones and other features to allow them to have feathers.

Scientists have long debated the evolutionary flow of birds.

Some scientists say that bird-like dinosaurs appear in the fossil catalog too late. Therefore, they cannot be the ancestors of birds. This debate is known as 'time paradox'.

This controversy is still very intense over the years mainly because fossil evidence finds too little and is not intact.

This new evidence is available at Daxishan in Jianchang, northeastern China.
Fossils are found in rocks, dating back to the end of the Jurassic period, about 151 to 161 million years ago. That means it is much older than Archeopteryx.

The study suggests that A. huxleyi should be considered dinosaurs rather than birds. It is a member of Troodontidae, a dinosaur branch closely related to flying creatures.