Dinosaur fossil gives clue to bird ancestry
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15/04/2005
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Pioneer (New Delhi)
The discovery of a pair of shelled eggs inside a female dinosaur, who died more than 65 million years ago, shows that the animals were very bird-like, but also resembled reptiles such as crocodiles, researchers said. Like birds, the dinosaur probably would not have been able to lay its entire clutch at once, but like a crocodile, she had two ovaries to make eggs, they write in Friday's issue of the journal Science. While the fossil does not answer the ultimate question of whether birds descended from dinosaurs, it will help answer questions about how birds, reptiles and dinosaurs are related, the international team of scientists said.