All baby birds have a moment prior to hatching when their hip bone is a tiny replica of a dinosaur's pelvis.
That's one of the findings in a new, Yale-led study in the journal Nature that explores the evolutionary underpinnings of the avian hip bone. It is also a modern-day nod to the dramatic transformation that led from dinosaurs to birds over tens of millions of years.
"Every single bird, in its early life, possesses this dinosaurian form," said Bhart-Anjan S. Bhullar, assistant professor of Earth & planetary science at Yale and senior and corresponding author of the new study. "Then, at the last minute, it's like it remembers it's a bird and needs a bird's pelvis."
The developing bird pelvis passes through ancestral dinosaurian conditions
That's one of the findings in a new, Yale-led study in the journal Nature that explores the evolutionary underpinnings of the avian hip bone. It is also a modern-day nod to the dramatic transformation that led from dinosaurs to birds over tens of millions of years.
"Every single bird, in its early life, possesses this dinosaurian form," said Bhart-Anjan S. Bhullar, assistant professor of Earth & planetary science at Yale and senior and corresponding author of the new study. "Then, at the last minute, it's like it remembers it's a bird and needs a bird's pelvis."
The developing bird pelvis passes through ancestral dinosaurian conditions