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Prehistoric Bird Brain May Be a Rosetta Stone for Avian Evolution

Learn more about Navaornis hestiae, the bird that could be a missing link to understanding how birds evolved from their prehistoric forbears.

Nov 26, 2024 4:00 PMNov 26, 2024 4:22 PM

(Credit Júlia D'Oliveira) A ‘one of a kind’ fossil discovery could transform our understanding of how the unique brains and intelligence of modern birds evolved, one of the most enduring mysteries of vertebrate evolution. Researchers have identified a remarkably well-preserved fossil bird, roughly the size of a starling, from the Mesozoic Era. The complete skull has been preserved almost intact: a rarity for any fossil bird, but particularly for one so ancient, making this one of the most significant finds of its kind.

The almost perfectly preserved skull of a prehistoric bird could be a sort of “Rosetta Stone” for understanding the evolution of avian intelligence — a process that has been a mystery until now.

The research team determined the bird — Navaornis hestiae — was from the Mesozoic Era (about 252 million to 66 million years ago) and was roughly the size of a starling. The bird likely lived around 80 million years ago and died out before the fifth mass extinction event that wiped out most non-avian dinosaurs.

According to the study published in the journal Nature, this fossil fills a 70-million-year gap in understanding how bird brains evolved from the earliest known avian-like dinosaur, the Archaeopteryx (that lived 150 million years ago), to modern-day birds.