Dinosaur Fossil With Intact Feathers Is a First

Researchers from the American Museum of Natural History have unearthed a 130-million-year-old dinosaur covered from head to tail with downy fluff and primitive feathers, above. They report in today’s Nature that it is the first dinosaur discovered with its entire body covering intact, providing the best evidence yet that animals developed feathers for warmth before they could fly. The dinosaur, discovered in China, is a dromaeosaur, a small, fast-running creature with a sickle claw on its middle toe and stiffening rods in its tail. It belongs to the class of theropods, with sharp teeth and bones strikingly similar to those of modern-day birds.

--Compiled by Times medical writer Thomas H. Maugh II