A New Raptor Fossil Discovered in China - http://clapway.com/2015/07/16/a-new-raptor-fossil-discovered-in-china567/

You know how the new Jurassic World film was pretty much all about the raptors in the movie? What’s not to like? They’re pretty charismatic on screen, and Blue had some awesome coloration.

Chinese raptor fossil found in Liaoning Province

Well, if you like dinosaurs, be prepared to become stoked about a real one; this new find in China of a raptor has been named the Zhenyuanlong suni. This type of raptor lived around 125 million years ago during the Early Cretaceous era.

The fossil was unearthed in the Liaoning Province, by a man named Sun Zhenyuan, who helped to get the fossil to the researchers for study. This is why fossil was named after him.

What do we know about the new raptor fossil thus far?

The research conducted on the fossil was made available today in Scientific Reports. The report was filed last year in November before it was accepted in April, then published today. There are two authors on this study; Junchang Lü and Stephen L. Brusatte.

Like many of the dinosaur fossils found in this region, this raptor is the relative of the Velociraptor we all have come to know from the Jurassic Park franchise. But it is also a feathered one as well, evident by the fossilized feathers, and research suggest it is closely related to birds given the anatomy structure of the fossil. The fossil is almost a full body skeleton.

raptor had wings?

The raptor fossil shows that it has probably around the height of a human and short appendages that looked like wings but probably couldn’t fly. There has been some joking or commentary that it basically looks like a human sized chicken or turkey, which is slightly scary if you have ever had to deal with aggressive poultry before.

One of the authors thought it was interesting to see the raptor fossil have winglike appendages without the actual intent of flying. The question then became why this dinosaur has wings, why has it evolved to have these in the first place. Other questions such as what its behavioral characteristics were begin to come to mind as well.

Only further research can be done to find out more about the fossil. That, and finding more similar fossils for further study.

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A New Raptor Fossil Discovered in China

Moroccan Desert Yields 400 Million-Year-Old Sea Creatures" Fossils - http://clapway.com/2015/07/12/moroccan-desert-yields-400-million-year-old-sea-creature-fossils679/

The sea creatures of olden days

It was during the Ordovician period that it was a rich time for Earth’s marine life, as it was teeming with sea creatures. All sorts of species swam the ocean depths until 400 million years later they were encased in Ordovician rocks, preserved, for scientists to find in the Moroccan desert.

Fossils of sea creatures add to recent flurry of prehistoric fossils

There have been a great many finds lately in the paleontology world, such as the worm with armor, or the arthropod that was recently found. This cluster of fossils will add to science’s growing catalogue of prehistoric species, and bolster our understanding of how early life adapted and evolved on our planet.

The fossils were found by fossil collector Mohamed Ben Moula at the Fezouata Biota in 2000. This area is known to have fossilized remains for more than fifty years, but it was only he that found a fossil with soft tissue, which is rare to find.

Sea creatures’ fossils are game-changing

When fossils are found, it’s a given that they sometimes cause us to reevaluate what we know about the prehistoric era that formed our planet as it is today. However, these have caused quite a stir in the science community because of how rare it is to find fossils from this very early period. Due to the environment of the time, fossilization wasn’t optimal at that time.

Yale professor Van Roy was shown the site by Ben Moula, and he collected a few specimens himself. He saw a variety of species from within the Ordovician period, some of which included fossils of known sea creatures, such as a horseshoe crab dated older than previously known. All of this data only serves to show that it’s very likely the species evolved earlier than we previously thought.

A lot of the research in this area was conducted by Van Roy and his team. They have other research on this particular era that can be found, such as their work on the faunas that was published in 2010.

It’s clear to all that this Ordovician period evidence is of great interest to this group of individuals, especially this Moroccan terrain where so many fossils of the period have begun to unveil themselves. Only time will tell what else the desert shows scientists about the sea from days so long ago.

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Moroccan Desert Yields 400 Million-Year-Old Sea Creatures" Fossils