This is a picture of lagosuchus, a close relative of dinosaurs, not the newly discovered Tianyulong, an ornithschian dinosaur covered in protofeathers. (Click here for a picture of Tianyulong by Lida Xing.) I drew this picture years ago to illustrate the idea that dinosaurs are descended from fuzzy warm-blooded creatures with elevated metabolisms. 20 years ago it was a reasonable idea, but there was no evidence for (or against) fuzz on small dinosaurs. (Scaly skin was known for some large dinosaurs, but large mammals are also often naked.) Greg Paul's comments on the Dinosaur Mailing List add some important information missed by the news stories covering this new discovery.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Tianyulong
This is a picture of lagosuchus, a close relative of dinosaurs, not the newly discovered Tianyulong, an ornithschian dinosaur covered in protofeathers. (Click here for a picture of Tianyulong by Lida Xing.) I drew this picture years ago to illustrate the idea that dinosaurs are descended from fuzzy warm-blooded creatures with elevated metabolisms. 20 years ago it was a reasonable idea, but there was no evidence for (or against) fuzz on small dinosaurs. (Scaly skin was known for some large dinosaurs, but large mammals are also often naked.) Greg Paul's comments on the Dinosaur Mailing List add some important information missed by the news stories covering this new discovery.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment