Scientists unveil the bird family tree
Researchers from 20 countries look at 48 species to reveal how they have flourished
Scientists have unveiled the most comprehensive bird "family tree" ever devised, using genetic data from 48 species to trace how modern bird lineages arose and flourished after the mass extinction that killed off the dinosaurs.
The work by researchers from 20 countries helps clarify the evolutionary relationships of modern bird groups and reveals the genetic underpinning of traits such as singing, toothlessness, colorful feathers and colour vision. The scientists decoded the genomes, an organism's genetic material, of 45 bird species and analysed those of three others previously sequenced. The list covered nearly all of the living bird groups.
The species included penguins, falcons, eagles, woodpeckers, owls, vultures, pelicans, cranes, crows, hornbills, cormorants, hummingbirds, pigeons, ducks, chickens, turkeys, ostriches, finches, loons, flamingos, swifts, and even the White-throated Tinamou.
"We have produced a well-resolved bird family tree and provided a clear picture of how the modern birds originated and evolved," said geneticist Guojie Zhang of the BGI genome research centre in Shenzhen and the University of Copenhagen.
Scientists think birds evolved from small, feathered dinosaurs. The earliest known bird, Archaeopteryx, was found to have lived 150 million years ago.
The researchers said most bird lineages from the age of dinosaurs disappeared during the mass extinction roughly 65 million years ago thought to have resulted from an asteroid striking the earth.