Overview
- Researchers analyzed nine Anchiornis fossils from eastern China dating to about 160 million years, each preserving distinctive feather coloration.
- A line of dark tips on pale wing feathers revealed wing layout and exposed developing feathers that were out of sequence with neighboring feathers.
- The irregular, asymmetric molting pattern contrasts with the symmetric molts of flying birds that maintain airworthy wings during feather replacement.
- The peer-reviewed study, led by Tel Aviv University's Yosef Kiat with collaborators in China and the United States, was published in Communications Biology.
- The team interprets the pattern as evidence these dinosaurs were probably flightless, supporting a more complex evolutionary history with gains and losses of flight-related traits.