Salma Talaat
A new dinosaur?
Dinosaurs first appeared 235 million years ago and, unfortunately, they disappeared 65 million years ago. While we, humans, thought that we knew all of the dinosaurs that could have possibly existed, a new discovery changes everything: the tail of a new kind of dinosaur was discovered in Amber.
It is our very first time to discover a body-part of a dinosaur in Amber. In fact, this dinosaur has feathers. So can we say that it could fly? Can we consider this animal as a pre-historic bird?
According to Ryan McKellar, curator of invertebrate paleontology at Canada ' s Royal Saskatchewan Museum,“ the dinosaur feathers feature a poorly defined central shaft( rachis) and appear to keel to either side of the tail. The open, flexible structure of the feathers is more similar to modern ornamental feathers than to flight feathers, which have well-defined central shafts, branches, sub-branches, and hooks that latch the structure together.” Unfortunately, this dinosaur is most likely incapable of flying.
Salma Talaat