New fossils imply a deeper origin of modern birds in the Mesozoic

doi:10.1093/nsr/nwaf238

IVPP-IR

	New fossils imply a deeper origin of modern birds in the Mesozoic
	Wu, Shaoyuan 1,2,3; Tao, Ziqi 1,4; Liu, Liang 5; Marshall, Charles R.6; Edwards, Scott, V 7; Zhou, Zhonghe8 ; Rheindt, Frank E.9
	2025-07-01
发表期刊	NATIONAL SCIENCE REVIEW
ISSN	2095-5138
卷号	12 期号:7 页码:6
通讯作者	Wu, Shaoyuan(shaoyuanwu@post.harvard.edu) ; Zhou, Zhonghe(zhouzhonghe@ivpp.ac.cn) ; Rheindt, Frank E.(dbsrfe@nus.edu.sg)
摘要	Macroevolutionary forces, such as rare catastrophes, have repeatedly disrupted and reset the evolutionary trajectories of Earth's major organismal groups. The Cretaceous-Paleogene (K/Pg) extinction event, approximately 66 Ma, resulted in the demise of similar to 75% of all species at the time, yet despite its magnitude, many major organismal lineages successfully passed through this mass extinction. The evolutionary origins of modern birds (crown-group Aves) remain a subject of substantial debate, as they are often thought to have undergone their primary diversification following the K/Pg boundary. In this review, we summarize the various approaches that have been applied to understanding the timing of avian diversification. We examine the inferred divergence times derived from modern phylogenomic studies based on datasets comprising 50 to over 300 whole genomes. Additionally, we evaluate the factors contributing to the continued discrepancies in divergence time estimates. Furthermore, we discuss significant new fossil discoveries from the Late Jurassic and Late Cretaceous periods that reshape our understanding of key evolutionary events in early avian diversification. Taken together, the paleontological evidence increasingly supports a Cretaceous origin for many extant bird lineages, with the major burst of ordinal diversification likely occurring prior to the K/Pg boundary-concurrent with the early radiations of flowering plants, pollinating insects, mammals, fishes and other groups that characterized the Cretaceous Angiosperm Terrestrial Revolution.
关键词	Mesozoic K/Pg boundary bird fossils modern bird diversification molecular clock
DOI	10.1093/nsr/nwaf238
关键词[WOS]	EXTANT AVIAN RADIATION ; CONFIDENCE-INTERVALS ; EXTINCTION ; DIVERSIFICATION ; CALIBRATION ; EVOLUTION ; MAMMALS ; RISE
收录类别	SCI
语种	英语
资助项目	National Natural Science Foundation of China[4288201] ; National Natural Science Foundation of China[32020103005] ; National Natural Science Foundation of China[31772441] ; Philip Sandford Boone Chair in Paleontology at the University of California, Berkeley
项目资助者	National Natural Science Foundation of China ; Philip Sandford Boone Chair in Paleontology at the University of California, Berkeley
WOS研究方向	Science & Technology - Other Topics
WOS类目	Multidisciplinary Sciences
WOS记录号	WOS:001525806300001
出版者	OXFORD UNIV PRESS
引用统计
文献类型	期刊论文
条目标识符	http://119.78.100.205/handle/311034/24465
专题	中国科学院古脊椎动物与古人类研究所
通讯作者	Wu, Shaoyuan; Zhou, Zhonghe; Rheindt, Frank E.
作者单位	1.Jiangsu Normal Univ, Sch Life Sci, Jiangsu Key Lab Phylogen & Comparat Genom, Xuzhou 221116, Peoples R China 2.Jiangsu Normal Univ, Lab Philosophy & Social Sci Univ Jiangsu Prov, Linguist Sci Lab, Xuzhou 221009, Peoples R China 3.Jiangsu Normal Univ, Sch Linguist Sci & Arts, Xuzhou 221009, Peoples R China 4.Xuzhou Cent Hosp, Xuzhou 221003, Peoples R China 5.Univ Georgia, Athens, GA 30606 USA 6.Univ Calif Berkeley, Univ Calif Museum Paleontol, Berkeley, CA 94720 USA 7.Harvard Univ, Museum Comparat Zool, Cambridge, MA 02138 USA 8.Chinese Acad Sci, Key Lab Vertebrate Evolut & Human Origins, Inst Vertebrate Paleontol & Paleoanthropol, Beijing 100044, Peoples R China 9.Natl Univ Singapore, Singapore 117543, Singapore
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	Wu, Shaoyuan,Tao, Ziqi,Liu, Liang,et al. New fossils imply a deeper origin of modern birds in the Mesozoic[J]. NATIONAL SCIENCE REVIEW,2025,12(7):6.
APA	Wu, Shaoyuan.,Tao, Ziqi.,Liu, Liang.,Marshall, Charles R..,Edwards, Scott, V.,...&Rheindt, Frank E..(2025).New fossils imply a deeper origin of modern birds in the Mesozoic.NATIONAL SCIENCE REVIEW,12(7),6.
MLA	Wu, Shaoyuan,et al."New fossils imply a deeper origin of modern birds in the Mesozoic".NATIONAL SCIENCE REVIEW 12.7(2025):6.