Body coverings such as hair and feathers have played a central role in evolution. They enabled warm-bloodedness by insulating the body, and were used for courtship, display, deterrence of enemies and, ...

“Mirasaura teaches us that a feather is only one of the many wondrous things that reptiles evolved to grow out of their skin,” wrote Yale University evolutionary biologist Richard Prum in an essay ...

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Reconstruction and illustration of Mirasaura grauvogeli in its natural forested environment. Illustration by Gabriel Ugueto, ...

A study determines when and how pterosaurs went from tiny tree-climbers to towering terrestrial titans Flying reptiles first came down from the trees in the mid-Jurassic Period, paving the way for ...

Mock vipers not only look like tree-dwelling vipers but also act like them. Intriguingly, they have a fake ‘fang’ in the front of their mouth, which befools a predator into thinking that they possess ...

Researchers discovered that a 215-million-year-old reptile started life on four legs and switched to two as an adult.

In a study of fossils, a research team led by evolutionary biologist and Johns Hopkins Medicine assistant professor Matteo Fabbri suggests that a group of giant reptiles alive up to 220 million years ...

Scientists may have discovered the world's oldest butthole after unearthing the nearly 300 million year old backend of a reptile in Germany, per an upcoming study in the journal Current Biology.

This piece first appeared in the Front Matter section of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. A small but fierce jawbone sits in Argentina’s natural science museum in Buenos Aires. Six ...