Wang Min squatted on the ground, with piles of split black rocks under his feet. He stood up a stone the size of a cutting board and split it into a 3mm thick slab the size of a smartphone. If there were fossils in it, the remains of ancient creatures would be exposed on the surface of the stone.
“You never know what you will find in the next hammer.” Faced with monotonous, boring and unknown work, scientific researchers often comfort and encourage themselves in this way. On November 11, 2023, Wang Min “chised” a surprise in the “Zhenghe fauna” located in Fujian Province – a bird fossil from the Luoji period.
He and colleagues from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleopakutaka and Paleomania of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (hereinafter referred to as the “Scholar Paleopakutaka”) worked with the team of the Fujian Provincial Institute of Geological Survey (hereinafter referred to as the “Fujian Geological Survey”) immediately carried out the research. They were delighted to discover that the birds on the fossils are one of the oldest birds in the world and the only exact Jurassic bird at present. Scientific researchers named it “Zhenghe Bamin Bird”, and the relevant research results were published in Nature on February 13, 2025, Beijing time.
Bone less than two centimeters long reveals important information
In April 2021, the Fujian Geological Research Institute discovered clues of the Lilong fossils in a geological data collected in the early 1970s. Then, in cooperation with Wang Min and Zhou Zhonghe, researchers from the Institute of Paleochronus Paleochronus, to start excavation work in the Daxi Basin in Zhenghe County, Nanping City, Fujian Province. They found a large number of well-preserved reptile fossils in the late Jurassic (Jurassic division early, mid and late) strata about 150 million years ago, and named it the “JianghedongKomiks species”.
The fossils here are mostly preserved in black carbon mudstone or shale, and some turtles live in aquatic or semi-aquatic environments. Researchers speculate that more than 100 million years ago, during the intermittent period of the volcanic eruption, the Taxi Basin formed a temporary small lake basin, and the swamp environment attracted a large number of animals to live here.
By high-precision isotope dating, “The duration of the “Fauna” was determined to be 150 million years to 148 million years ago, which belongs to the late Jurassic period. This is the late Jurassic period known to the world, and the southernmost geographical location is preserved. It provides a new window for studying the evolution of the terrestrial ecosystem of the late Mesozoic era in East Asia.
Fossils are rarely exposed to the rock surface. In the quarry pit at a depth of 4 meters, the daily work of the field team members is to move out and chop the slabs from morning to night to see if there are fossils in Cinema. “We have discovered a large number of turtles, fish and dragon fossils, but my search target is on dinosaurs and birds. “Wang Min said.
On October 23, 2022, the joint team discovered dinosaur fossils in Fujian for the first time and named it “Strange Fujian Dragon”. “Strange Fujian Dragon” belongs to the bird-winged dinosaurs. The bird-winged dinosaurs are a transitional species in the process of dinosaurs evolution into birds. The academic community defines “the most generalized group that includes all birds, but does not include the dinosaurs” as bird-winged ones, and birds refer to modern birds and their close relatives. The discovery of “Strange Fujian Dragon” fills out some of the gaps in the origin of birds in time and space.
Wang Min’s team goes to Fujian for field work more than four months every year, the first is from March to May, and the second is November , in order to avoid the rainy season and high temperatures. He clearly remembered that on November 11, 2023, it started raining on the sky, and the road to the mountain slippery on the rainy day. Most of the team members would rest. In order to improve and enrich their lives, everyone cooked homemade hot pot. While eating, the rain was clear and the ground was blown dry by the wind, more than 10 players in high spirits decided to go up the mountain together.
After a while, the God of Luck favored them. On a knocked stone slab, some of the shoulder strap bones were exposed from the surrounding rock. Although it was less than two centimeters long, the bones in these key parts revealed important information. “In the fossils, the scapula and black beak bones are very clear in shape, and the two birds are BabaylanThe bones are separated, while most dinosaurs are healed into one, called the scapular black beak bone. “Wang Min excitedly took a photo and sent it to Zhou Zhonghe, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a researcher at the Institute of Paleopause. Both of them thought at first glance that this was a precious bird fossil. Cinema
The key tail thong bone
Birds are currently the most diverse and ecological diversity on the earth, with more than 11,000 species. The evolution of birds from dinosaurs is undoubtedly the most shocking scene in the history of life evolution, involving a large number of bones, muscles, epidermal derivatives and other biological structuresChanges. Theoretical research on macroevolution speculates that the increase in bird diversity first occurred in the Jurassic, that is, no later than 145 million years ago. However, this hypothesis lacks support for fossil evidence, and bird fossils were very rare during this period.
At present, only the well-known Jurassic birds are found in the Archaeopteryx (Archaeopteryx) in the Late Jurassic birds in Germany. Wang Min said that Archaeoptera lived in the late Jurassic period about 150 million years ago. In 1861, a fossil of the feather of Archaeoptera was discovered in Sorenhofen, Germany. Due to its feathers, Archaeoptera was considered a bird at that time. However, with the emergence of more than 10 Archaeoptera fossils since then, it was discovered that it also has long tailbones like lizards, crocodiles and other reptiles.
Some recent studies believe that Archaeoptera belongs to the species of Dinosaur, not birds. “In layman’s terms, it is difficult to define a group of individual characteristics. For example, later people discovered that feathers are not unique to birds, but also appear in dinosaurs in large numbers.” Xu, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and director of the Institute of Paleochronus Paleozoics, explained that during the transition period of dinosaurs to bird evolution, judging that a species is more biased towards dinosaurs or birds, in addition to significant characteristics, experts will also conduct phylogenetic analysis and understand the specific location of each species through quantitative research methods on the “life evolutionCinema tree”.
Komiks, including the birds and dragons and the climbing birds, have also been classified as birds, but these hypotheses have great controversy. These problems are like a dark cloud, shrouded at the nodes of the origin of birds, plaguing evolutionary biologists.
If Archaeoptera is not a bird, is there any bird that is definitely cut in the Jurassic? Wang Min’s team found the answer in the Jurassic strata of China’s “Zhenghe Biota”. After a year of indoor restoration and research analysis, the research team determined that the fossils accidentally obtained on the afternoon when the rain first cleared, belonged to bird fossils. They named it the Baminarnis zhen, Babaylan ghensis, which is an ancient name in Fujian.
“The most special thing about the Bamin bird is that it has a healed tail bone, which is the cornerstone of the modern bird’s body shape.” Speaking of the key feature of identifying the Zhenghe Bamin bird as a bird, Wang Min said that the reptile has a long tail and multiple tail vertebrae. The most significant difference between birds and other reptiles is that their tails are very short. Not only does the number of tail vertebrae decrease, but the last few tail vertebrae heal into a structure called tail plexus. The emergence of tail thoracic bones not only helps birds lose weight, but also moves their body center of gravity forward, maintaining continuous stability during flight.
Zhou Zhonghe said that the tail thong bone also has a function of Komiks, which is to attach the tail feather. “In addition to wings, tail feathers also play an important role in bird flight.”
Character bone shortening is one of the most thorough morphological changes in the evolution of dinosaurs to birds. Including “potential Jurassic birds” such as Archaeoptera and Cinema, they still have long tail bones like dinosaurs. From this point of view, they are at least very different from birds in size.
The Bamin bird reveals that the body shape and structure of modern birds have appeared in the late Jurassic period, and the study has earlier appeared nearly 20 million years.
Rewrite the evolution history of birds
The Bamin bird specimen is not complete and has no head. According to the thickness of its bones, experts speculate that it weighs about 100 grams, which is similar to the cockatoo and is 1-2 times smaller than that of the individual adult Archaeoptera. As for Babaylan‘s feeding properties and flight capabilities, it cannot be inferred based on the existing fossils for the time being.
When observing the Bamin Bird, experts also discovered an interesting phenomenon – “contradictory” often arises between its body and bones. Its shoulder straps and waistbands have progressive characteristics and are more similar to birds, such as separate black berries and scapula, but the forelimbs retain the original form of the thief dinosaur.
“This situation similar to a puzzle is called mosaic evolution, which has caused a phenomenon of complexity in the early history of bird evolution,” said Wang Min.
Phylogenetic analysis based on the simplified and Bayesian method supports the bird classification location of Zhenghe Bamin birds. The Zhenghe Bamin Bird is currently the only exact Jurassic bird that lives between 148 million and 150 million years ago. Through the estimation of evolutionary time, the discovery of the Bamin birds has advanced the time of origin of birds to an earlier Mid-Jurassic eveningBabaylanThe period (172 million years to 1.6 million years ago) has rewritten the history of bird evolution and demonstrated the huge potential of the “Zhenghe fauna” in exploring the evolution of the late middle-aged Cinema ecosystem in East Asia.
How did dinosaurs evolve into birds? Xu Xing said that there are two driving factors in the origin and diversity of biological groups, including birds, in addition to the organisms themselves, there is also the external environment. During the middle of the Jurassic period, the temperature, humidity, etc. of the earth changed, which would have an impact on biodiversity. “What impact does such a change have on birds? It is exactly what we are doing.”
300 days and 3 fossils
In addition to discovering the Bamin bird, the research team also discovered a separate fork bone. The research results show that this fork bone is very similar to the modern bird species of the Cretaceous period (the earliest modern bird species appeared 130 million years ago), and is significantly different from the Zhenghe Bamin birds, as well as other Jurassic birds and dinosaurs. “The discovery of wishbone confirms that at least two birds live in Zhenghe fauna. If the wishbone does belong to the current bird type, the time of the bird’s origin will be further advanced,” said Wang Min. During the more than 300 days of field inspection, the scientific research team discovered the strange Fujian dragon, Zhenghe Bamin Bird and Fork Bone. In Wang Min’s opinion, this is already very lucky. “In most days of field excavation, it is normal to get nothing.” He said that for such a very uncertain and exploratory study, Mr. Zhou Zhonghe gave young people great confidence and encouragement. “He has always said that it is normal to find it, but it is unexpected if you find it.”
“The probability and risk of finding bird fossils in the Jurassic strata are low and the risk is high, but there are still scientific researchers willing to engage in such work, so it should provide a relaxed scientific research environment for such basic research and exploratory research, rather than setting expected goals when applying for projects.” Zhou Zhonghe said that truly important scientific research results are often difficult to predict. This research has been funded by the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Frontier Science Key Research Program from “0 to 1” original innovation ten-year projects. In the future, we hope that such major research discoveries with strong originality can be stable support and guaranteed.
Talking about the significance of this type of basic research, Xu Xing said that in recent years, an important research direction of the Institute of Paleochia is the process and mechanism of the emergence of biodiversity. Dinosaurs evolved into birds, from landAs relevant research deepens, biological evolution events to the sky can not only answer questions about “when did the first bird appear” and “when did the dinosaurs fly into the sky first”, but will also help bionics and other research. “For example, we conduct cooperative research to simulate some extinct organisms and study how they fly more efficiently during the transformation from sea to land and from land to sky. These cognitions can help people design more efficient aircraft.
At present, the transformation of scientific research paradigm brought by artificial intelligence has attracted attention. Can artificial intelligence that can write code help paleontologists study fossils? Wang Min said that the application of artificial intelligence in paleontology is gradually developing. However, the fossil specimens of dinosaurs and birds are squeezed and deformed, and for picture recognition, a large amount of training data is difficult to obtain. “Paleontology research relies on the accumulation of discipline knowledge and a large amount of practice. It is necessary to see fossils more, so we do not have a great sense of crisis. But artificial intelligence will definitely update paleontological research methods, such as efficiently analyzing the causes and trends of increasing biodiversity based on accumulating a large amount of paleontological data. This is a direction for the future. ”
”I think the biggest surprise of paleontology research or field excavation is that you never know what will be knocked out with the next hammer. It may be nothing, or it may be an exciting dinosaur fossil. “Wang Min said that this discovery is like an exclamation mark, but it is not the end. There are more and more complete fossils waiting for them to dig and study, thereby revealing more mysteries of dinosaurs’ evolution into birds.