Research by UCC Professor suggests dinosaurs were feathered

Brian ConmyResearch on a newly discovered dinosaur has led scientists to rethink what dinosaurs may have looked like.The species, named Kulindadromeus zabaikalicus, was discovered in the Kulinda fossil site in eastern Siberia, where six skulls and several hundred partial skeletons were uncovered. The specimen showed scales on its lower legs and tail, with short bristles on its back leading to its head. The interesting aspect of the specimen though is the compound feathers on its arms and legs.

"All dinosaurs had feathers, or at least the potential to sprout feathers.”

These feathers were studied by Dr. Maria McNamara of UCC, a palaeontologist in the School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences. Her research specialises in how soft tissues, such as the feathers discovered on this dinosaur, are preserved in fossils.Other colleagues of Dr. McNamara contributing to the study of this fossil include scientists from the UK, Belgium and France, including the project’s leader, Dr. Pascal Godefroit of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural History.On the discovery, Dr. McNamara said; “these feathers are really very well preserved. We can see each filament and how they are joined together at the base, making a compound structure of six or seven filaments, each up to 15 millimetres long.”This discovery suggests that feather like structures were widespread in a variety of dinosaurs, even in their earliest forms, dating as far back as the Triassic period more than 220 million years ago.While they may have been used for insulation and signalling, they were later used for flight in certain species, while more dinosaurs may have lost the feature as they grew larger.Although other species of dinosaurs were previously discovered with feather like structures intact in their fossils, this example of feathers is much clearer and shows three distinct type of feathering.Kulindadromeus was a small herbivorous dinosaur only about one metre long. Its features included long hind legs and short arms with five strong fingers; a short snout and teeth adapted to eat plants suggest that the species sat low on the evolutionary tree of Ornithischian dinosaurs.Lead author, Dr. Godefroit concluded; “I was really amazed when I saw this. We knew that some of the plant-eating Ornithischian dinosaurs had simple bristles, and we couldn’t be sure whether these were the same kinds of structures as bird and theropod feathers.“Our new find clinches it: all dinosaurs had feathers, or at least the potential to sprout feathers.”This research was published in the international academic journal, Science.