Scientific study suggests dinosaurs flapped their wings as they ran

Scientists from China's Tshinghua University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences reported bird flight may have evolved from wing-flapping by running dinosaurs. These findings support the hypothesis flight could have evolved up from the ground, in contrast to models in which active flapping flight evolved after gliding, a passive form of flight.

Caudipteryx. Photo: Kabacchi/Wikinews (CC BY 2.0)

The authors proposed that, in Caudipteryx, from a mechanical perspective, two-legged running automatically induced wing flapping. The authors of the report used a mathematical model, a robot, and young ostriches to test their hypotheses.

For the study, the researchers chose Caudipteryx zoui, a dinosaur about the size of a peacock known to have feathered wings but not flight. It weighed about 10 lbs (5 kg) and the researchers estimate it had a top speed of about 18 mph (8 m/s).

Using modal effective mass theory, the team conceptualized the dinosaur's body as a series of springs and other components, first as a computer model and then as a physical robot. In both scenarios, running at medium speed produced vibrations making the animal's wings flap.

This work shows that the motion of flapping feathered wings was developed passively and naturally as the dinosaur ran on the ground. Although this flapping motion could not lift the dinosaur into the air at that time, the motion of flapping wings may have developed earlier than gliding.

They also attached sets of artificial wings to juvenile ostriches about the same size as Caudipteryx. They found the faster each ostrich ran, the more it tended to flap, with larger wings providing more lift.

Although Caudipteryx is in the same evolutionary group as birds and other theropods, it lived millions of years after flying dinosaurs, such as Archaeopteryx, were already in the air.

While current consensus among scientists says birds as we understand them evolved from theropod dinosaurs, there are several competing ideas about how exactly flight developed in these vertebrates.

Some scientists believe the first fliers were tree-dwelling dinosaurs who could parachute and glide before they could fly, while some say flight grew up from the ground, from runners. (Wikinews)

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

Complex Organics Bubble up from Enceladus

Data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft reveal complex organic molecules originating from Saturn's icy moon Enceladus, strengthening the idea that this ocean world hosts conditions suitable for life. Research results show much larger, heavier molecules than ever before.

Overhunting of large animals has catastrophic effects on trees

The elephant has long been an important spiritual, cultural and national symbol in Thailand. At the beginning of the 20th century, its numbers exceeded 100,000. Today, those numbers have plunged to 2,000.

Scientists chart a baby boom in southwestern Native Americans from 500 to 1300 A.D.

Scientists have sketched out one of the greatest baby booms in North American history, a centuries-long "growth blip" among southwestern Native Americans between 500 and 1300 A.D.

Artificial Leaves Convert CO2 to Fuel 10 Times More Efficient Than Nature

Researchers have proposed a design solution that could improve leaf, which would use carbon dioxide from the air, and convert CO2 to fuel at least 10 times more efficient than natural leaves.

First-Ever Black-Hole 'Visual Binary' Revealed

Using the supersharp radio "vision" of the US National Science Foundation's Very Long Baseline Array astronomers have made the first detection of orbital motion in a pair of supermassive black holes in a galaxy some 750 million light-years from Earth.

Scientists identify how the exosomes of the parasite responsible for Chagas disease affect heart cells

A team of scientists from the University of Granada (UGR) has broken new ground in Chagas disease research. This is a serious parasitic disease that affects more than 8 million people worldwide and for which there is currently no treatment.