(ORDO NEWS) — Dinosaurs lived millions of years ago, and modern people do not yet reliably know everything about these prehistoric monsters. Another study told about the process of evolution of these animals.
According to the standard family tree of dinosaurs, these ancient creatures were divided into lizard-whales and ornithischians.
Three years ago, experts criticized the usual theory of the evolution of these animals, saying that tyrannosaurs and brontosaurs from the lizard-like group began to develop more intensively first. Recent scientific work has led experts to eventually confirm the classic view of the evolution of dinosaurs.
A group of specialists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, together with colleagues from South American states, again studied the bones of the Spinosaurus, which is considered the earliest representative of the ornithischians in the fossil environment. This animal was attributed to the period 229 million years ago, that is, when the first creatures of this kind appeared on the planet.
This suggests that the two groups of dinosaurs descended from a common ancestor at approximately the same time, which speaks in favor of the long-accepted view of the evolution of creatures.
The experts also managed to date rocks in the Argentine region of Ischigualasto, where there are sedimentary rocks that have preserved a large number of remains of the oldest dinosaurs. Taking all this information into account, researchers from the United States and their colleagues suggested that the ancient creatures first appeared in South America and only then scattered around the world.
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