Dinosaur Feathers: Dinosaurs' True Colors Revealed For First Time (PHOTOS)

Special from National Geographic by Paleontology Editor Chris Sloan

Pigments have been found in fossil dinosaurs for the first time, a new study says.

The discovery may prove once and for all that dinosaurs' hairlike filaments--sometimes called dino fuzz--are related to bird feathers, paleontologists announced today.

The finding may also open up a new world of prehistoric color, illuminating the role of color in dinosaur behavior and allowing the first accurately colored dinosaur re-creations, according to the study team.

Read the full story at National Geographic News.

First True-Color Dinosaur

• • • • Sinosauropteryx, a turkey-size carnivorous dinosaur, is the first dinosaur—excluding birds, which many paleontologists consider to be dinosaurs—to have its color scientifically established. In a report released online today by the journal Nature, an international team of paleontologists and experts in scanning electron micrography infer that this dinosaur had reddish orange feathers running along its back and a striped tail.

Comments

[rf dude]

12:37 AM on 02/01/2010

'
It was a feathered boa, found around a fossil Lounge Lizard...

[rupert12]

01:32 PM on 01/30/2010

This is cool. I loved dinosaurs as a kid, and I've always thought that assuming they all had greenish gray lizard skin was selling them, and nature, short. There were so many different types and sizes, they could have had all kinds of crazy appearances and weird aspects that were destroyed during the fossilization process.

[James I Kirkland]

09:05 PM on 01/29/2010

While, this is one method of looking at these fabulous fossils for evidence of color, some of my colleagues have been doing scans of some of the birds from this same site in China (unfortunately specimens stolen from China in private collections; problems with future access, ie. repeatability of the experiment by other scientists)... Anyway by looking at trace elements in the feathers (like copper), they are getting information on the color patterns on these extinct birds. I do not believe they have tried it on any of the feathered dinosaurs yet and I'm trying to get them to try it on properly curated specimens in China. All interesting stuff!

[horhay]

02:16 AM on 01/30/2010

Yes, very interesting. When you mentioned specimens were stolen for private collections, I kept thinking about the Indiana Jones quote,"That belongs in a museum!"

[Matayo]

09:27 AM on 02/01/2010

"So do you!"

[tjconkster]

07:54 PM on 01/29/2010

I remember growing up in "the church" back in the '70s and having fossils explained to me by the minister. The fossil he was referring to was that of a dinosaur with feathers. It looked very bird like and as he claimed was an attempt to disprove creationism and prove evolution. His explanation of this fossil was that it was actually an x-ray of a lizard and an x-ray of a bird superimposed on each other. It was the devils work and we as children of god should dismiss it out of hand. Then he went into a rant about how evil science is and if we believed or even discussed evolution our mortal souls would be condemned to hell. Kinda scary for a kid.

Pretty sad really, lame reasoning followed by inducing fear. Hmm, sounds like today's republican party!

[jp5472]

11:54 AM on 01/30/2010

...and then he jumped into his big 70's Cadillac (the kind all "modest" men of the cloth had) and zoomed off getting 8 miles to the gallon burning fossil fuel...those evils of science!! Where would daily life be without them?

[woundedduck]

04:27 PM on 01/29/2010

Why does the artist's rendering have the dinosaurs square dancing?

[RealityBaseCamp]

03:52 PM on 01/29/2010

Dinosaurs was birdies!!!

Well, close, anyway.

[invirginia]

04:35 PM on 01/30/2010

Actually, I think birds were dinosaurs.

[RealityBaseCamp]

08:16 PM on 01/30/2010

That too! They still are. Kinda.

But I mean they were already on the way to being birds, but they looked like lizards, so a lot of people made presumptions. I was raised on dinosaurs as lizards, Jupiter with 12 moons, & a Universe that was slowing its expansion. I love learning unexpected things. It's always wilder that we thought.

[Zacky Ahmed]

03:48 PM on 01/29/2010

personally I do believe
there is people who are in denial.
and they are those who seek immortal life.
what makes us more different from other species
we are the same, except we are far more advanced

I think, its hard to accept in the beginning
that religion doesnt exist,
because it gives people comfort,
when their loved ones passes away.
but we just have to accept the reality,

[LMPE]

03:46 PM on 01/29/2010

The dinosaurs revealed their true colors. Not until George Allen said "macaca" would anyone do that much to show his true colors.

[Zacky Ahmed]

03:44 PM on 01/29/2010

I know this will sound controversial
but I was in denial, and very conservative,
when people said to me creationism doesnt exist.

then i began watching and researching
biology, ethologi and science
watched tons and tons of documentaries
from Richard Dawkins, to Michio Kaku

and it was soo amazing too see their efforts
they devoted their life, for the people.

Now I cant get myself to believe that religion exists.
its like i been woken up, now.
The Bible and The Quran cannot be true.

[TheGripester]

05:29 PM on 01/29/2010

I'm not very pious either, but why does it have to be either/or? Some of the greatest minds in the past two centuries were devout, and yet brilliant scientists who did not compromise their beliefs.

I think the greatest truth we can find in the debate is not that science negates all religion, but that those who wrote the religious texts were not scientists. Humans will always need to express themselves in metaphor and symbolic language, and religion addresses that need.

[HarrietteTheSpy]

10:55 PM on 01/29/2010

Totally, I can believe in both (as I define them). Only people who live in boxes have a hard time holding spiritual/scientific positions simultaneously.

[TheGripester]

02:22 PM on 01/29/2010

I'm a little dubious about the first photo - the "artist's rendering." It portrays these mini-dinos with their tails sticking straight up behind them in a display. This seems to be based on the position of the tails in the fossil in the second photo. However - in death, the cartilage along the base of the tails and necks of dinosaurs would naturally tighten, which is why their fossils are typically found in such twisted positions. I suspect that something of the same nature is happening here, and that the tails of these little creatures stuck out horizontally, not vertically, behind them in life just like all other dinosaurs.

[darkpragmatist]

06:11 PM on 03/06/2010

if i understood what i read, the belief is that the head and tail moved in compliment of each other like in some modern birds. for instance, the peacock can't hold it's tail up and look down at the same time which lead to the folk lore that peacocks are ashamed of their feet. so i assume the inverse is believed to be true as well, ie. that they can't hold their tails down and look up at the same time.

[MarsAmbassador]

02:20 PM on 01/29/2010

I bet some dinosaurs had some crazy mating dances. I bet feathers played an increasing part of that.

[invirginia]

04:36 PM on 01/30/2010

Akin to a Vegas stripper show.

[horhay]

02:12 PM on 01/29/2010

Those Sinosauropteryx look a lot like my buff orpington rooster. He even raises his hackles and goes into attack mode just like in that picture.

[somsoc]

02:04 PM on 01/29/2010

Won't this put another feather up the arse of the creationist mor0ns.

[heroine addict]

01:00 PM on 01/29/2010

ALL YOAR HAPPY TURKEY LEMURS ARE BELONG TO US!

[KayWrites]

12:59 PM on 01/29/2010

I love scientists. They just make my day. Just when I am nauseous over politics, scientists show up with cool stuff that makes life worth living.

[eXcommunicate]

03:22 PM on 01/29/2010

Here here! :)

[HarrietteTheSpy]

10:56 PM on 01/29/2010

yes and just when I am sickened by some of the vile (vitriolic) commenters finding mean things to say, i can come here and be relieved!