Small genomes for better flyers
Article Abstract:
A study of whether genome size reduction in birds extended to protein-coding genes used comparisons between 111 introns and 141 exons similar in humans and chickens. Reduced genome size was revealed as an adaption for flying in vertebrates and genome size reduction in birds did not occur due to mutation as earlier results suggest. Comparisons show that DNA losses in chicken genes are uneven in long introns and avian genome size reduction occurred gradually over a long time.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1995
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A new link between theropods and birds from the Cretaceous of Mongolia
Article Abstract:
The evolution of birds from theropod dinosaurs may well have been clarified by the identification of a fossil skull from the Late Cretaceous of Mongolia that merges the features of the two groups. The specimen, unearthed in 1965 by the Polish-Mongolian Paleontological Expedition, has been given the scientific name Archaeornithoides deinosauriscus. The skull's maxillary palatal shelf and teeth reveal that this theropod had bird-like anatomical characteristics.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 1992
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Evolution of growth pattern in birds
Article Abstract:
It has been possible to identify evidence for an early postnatal slowing-down of growth in two lineages of flying basal birds, indicating that birds could have begun their evolution as precocious fliers. It was found that Rahonavis, a late Malagasy survivor of basal birds, and the Enantiornithes, the leading group of Cretaceous land birds, have much less or no fibrolamellar bone than both non-avian maniraptorans and euornithine birds.
Publication Name: Nature
Subject: Zoology and wildlife conservation
ISSN: 0028-0836
Year: 2001
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