Word: theropod
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...latest issue of Nature, is about as good a missing link as anyone could want. "It has things that are undeniably feathers," exults Richard Prum, of the University of Kansas Natural History Museum, an expert on the evolution of feathers. "But it is clearly a small, vicious theropod similar to the velociraptors that chased the kids around the kitchen in Jurassic Park...
...anatomical similarities, that birds might be descended from the dinosaurs. But for decades, nobody could produce much detailed physical evidence to back up the theory. It wasn't until the 1970s that Yale paleontologist John Ostrom began building a bone-by-bone case for the link--at least for theropod dinosaurs, which include velociraptors and tyrannosaurs. By the mid-1990s, the list of parts common to birds and dinos included wishbones, breastbones, three-toed feet, hollow bones and swiveling wrist joints...
...happens so often in paleontology, though, the story has become much more muddled. The confusion began in 1964 with the discovery of a 13-ft.-long theropod called Deinonychus that was remarkably similar to Archaeopteryx, perhaps 50 million years more recent, but lacked wings and feathers. Apparently, the evolution from theropod to bird took many turns and detours...
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