Fossil stokes bird-origin feud

摘要

A birdlike fossil that dates to roughly 155 million years ago is ruffling the feathers of some paleontologists. At issue is whether the fossil is a dinosaur, an early bird or something in between."This new animal is the most primitive bird in the world," says paleontologist Pascal Godefroit of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences. He and an international team of colleagues describe the new specimen May 29 in Nature.