In the scientific expedition yesterday (October 4), the tail vertebrae of the dinosaur fossil have gradually been revealed. Today, the field work has entered the "hard bone" stage, what interesting discoveries will be made?
The dinosaur fossil was found on a hillside. The whole neighborhood is a mountainous area, the weather in the valley is changeable, one moment the sun is shining, and the next moment there is a sudden sun rain, resulting in some muddy roads and work points in the mountainous area, which has caused certain difficulties in scientific research work.
However, the staff said that this was a common occurrence in the field. As long as the dinosaur fossils can be well protected, these difficulties are not a problem.
The scientific expedition work has entered the stage of "gnawing hard bones"
The weather staff does not care, but the fossils give real problems. For the first two days, our field work started from both ends and advanced to the middle. Today, we finally came to the "hard bones" section. This hard bone is not a metaphor, it is a real hard bone, called the recommended vertebrae of the dinosaur.
Wang Tao, director of the Dinosaur Fossil Conservation Research Center of Lufeng City: Because the vertebrae are connected to the crotch and sacrum of the dinosaur, they are glued together and closely connected with the surrounding bones to form a belt.
So what role do the vertebrae and surrounding bones play in Lu Fenglong?
Xing Lida, associate professor of China University of Geosciences: Recommending vertebrae and connected bones can support the balance of the dinosaur body, the recommended vertebrae and the belt around it are located in the waist position of the dinosaur, which is structurally the center of gravity of the dinosaur, as well as supporting the abdominal cavity, the muscles will assist the movement of the hind limbs, support the tail, maintain balance and other effects. Lu Fenglong's intestinal bones are short, which means that the muscles of its thighs are also very narrow, not so strong, so it will not run fast. The Tyrannosaurus rex had large intestinal bones and strong legs.
The dinosaurs we find are generally skeletons, and scientists rely on what to restore their flesh and skin?
Initially, paleontologists used the skin of crocodiles, lizards to infer the epidermis of dinosaurs. When the art is restored, it is also necessary to add the imagination of some painters. Restoring dinosaur skin "younger relatives" is a reference, and with the deepening of dinosaur research, scientists have gradually discovered some particularly well-preserved dinosaur fossils, which have left skin imprints, such as platypus with almost complete "mummies". Even some well-preserved dinosaur footprints have traces of skin on the feet, most of the dinosaur scales are subhexagonal, and the large scales are surrounded by small scales, which are combined to form a rose.
The skin of the sauropod dinosaur where Lu Fenglong is located can be roughly referred to the skin of Mamenxi Dragon, and paleontologists found a skin fossil near the sit bone of Mamenxi Dragon, which is a series of polygonal scales, which is the first case of sauropod dinosaur skin fossils found in China. The scales are only the size of a coin, so you can't tell the details from three or four meters or more.
Restoring dinosaur colors A combination of science and art
Most of the colors of dinosaurs are imaginary, but this can not be imagined, should be based on the ecological environment at that time, or the living habits of animals to infer. Some dinosaurs, especially those with feathers, can infer their color based on the shape of the melanoids in their feather fossils.
In addition, if you see dinosaurs with exaggerated ridge crowns, tail feathers, and high nerve spines, these may be the basis of their vividness, which is used to show off.
The geographical environment of Lufeng in the Jurassic period is a big conjecture
The color of the surface of the expedition site is somewhat unusual, why is this? Let's follow our shots and go together to find the answer ↓↓↓
Around the excavation site of Lufeng Expedition, a kind of red surface can be seen everywhere. Geologists told reporters that this is exactly the sedimentary formation left by the early Jurassic period 180 million years ago, where all kinds of valuable information are hidden.
Professor Zhang Shitao, School of Land and Resources Engineering, Kunming University of Science and Technology: These components in the rocks are red and have a high degree of oxidation, and generally we think that they are formed in an arid and hot environment.
Geologists speculate that in the early Jurassic Period, the weather in the Lufeng Basin was relatively dry and hot, and after the river steamed, a savannah grassland was formed, just like the current East African steppe, which was very suitable for large reptiles. Lu Feng Dragon and giant Lu Feng Dragon leisurely walk through the sparse trees to feed. When you come to the location of the middle Jurassic formation, the scene here is very different.
Zhang Shitao, professor of the School of Land and Resources Engineering of Kunming University of Science and Technology: The red color here is relatively bright, indicating that the degree of oxidation in this section is not as high as the early Jurassic strata below. This place is very delicate, like clay, which means that the environmental water it formed is very peaceful, indicating that the lake area in this mid-Jurassic place is expanding.
The more colorful and delicate stratigraphic sediments have led geologists to speculate that by the Middle Jurassic period, the climate was wetter and the lake water level was higher. At the scene, the discovery of some fish scales and fishbone fossils also confirmed this inference.
In the middle of the Jurassic Period, the waters of the Lufeng Basin expanded, becoming a paradise for aquatic animals, while the area of the lakeside plain was greatly compressed, so dinosaurs and other land creatures chose to migrate to the Chuanjie Basin not far away and continue to evolve and reproduce, so the huge Chuanjie Dragon appeared. By the late Jurassic period, the climate became dry again.
Zhang Shitao, professor of the School of Land and Resources Engineering of Kunming University of Science and Technology: The set of lithologic features of the late Jurassic period is very similar to the early Jurassic period, indicating that by the late Jurassic period, this environment has become very similar to the early Jurassic.
What did dinosaur fossils look like after the Late Jurassic Period? At present, it has not been found in Lufeng. Did the dinosaurs leave Lufeng completely? Is it because of climate change, or is it because of crustal movement? All of this leaves people with endless reverie. Geologists say that we still have too much to know about dinosaurs, and we may never know the truth, but through scientific research, we can infinitely approach the truth. Looking forward to more research results that will bring us closer to that distant era.
Explore the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
The main food of carnivorous dinosaurs was vegetarian dinosaurs, while vegetarian dinosaurs mainly fed on ferns, conifers, ginkgo biloba, palms and other plants. Let's go to the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences to see those plants from the age of dinosaurs ↓↓↓
Many dinosaur film and television dramas must have seen its figure - palm, which is a monocotyledonous plant from the age of dinosaurs, probably originating in the middle of the Cretaceous Period. That is to say, it once lived with dinosaurs, and it may be one of the foods of dinosaurs. And the fruit of this palm family is likely to have been a dinosaur's dish.
Liang Shuiqing, Paleoecology Research Group, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences: There are some modern animals that will eat the fruits of the palm family or its flowers, and we will guess whether some dinosaurs in the dinosaur era would also eat this thing.
The leaf that bears a resemblance to the palm is cycad, which, although it looks like it, has existed on Earth for much longer than the palm.
Liang Shuiqing, Paleoecology Research Group, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences: Cycads are rare and endangered plants under first-class protection in China, and are also known as living fossils in the plant kingdom.
The current results show that cycads first existed in the Early Permian, about 280 million years ago, when dinosaurs had not yet appeared. Cycad is the oldest gymnosperm, bringing a lot of ancient information: some researchers have found that its stomata parameters in the Mesozoic period were lower than the stomata parameters of existing cycads, which is likely to indicate that the atmospheric nitrogen dioxide concentration at that time was much higher than today's levels.
In the era when dinosaurs lived, there were no flowers or grass on the earth. For vegetarian dinosaurs, ferns that were already in existence at the time should also be a good food choice.
Liang Shuiqing, Paleoecology Research Group, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences: Quercus is the king of ferns, its history is even older than that of dinosaurs, it and dinosaurs experienced the Mesozoic period, when it was widely distributed, very prosperous, is the food source of some plant-eating dinosaurs. But now due to geological changes, historical changes, extreme environmental and climatic events, it is becoming less and less common, is a very endangered species.
Chengjiang Animal Fossil Group: Unveiling the Cambrian "Explosion of Life"
The dinosaur fossils found at the No. 1 scientific expedition site have gone through hundreds of millions of years, seeing these fossils, in addition to sighing, we can't help but ask, how long ago was the source of life? Next, we're going to the Cambrian Period, 530 million years away, a milestone in the history of life on Earth. There was a big explosion of life in the ocean, and the "great relay of life" on Earth began. In Chengjiang, Yunnan, there is such a place, where there is the world's most known biodiversity of the early Cambrian biota, more than 200 kinds of marine life fossils, witnessed the first explosion of life.
Located in the chengjiang river in central Yunnan, because of a discovery, shocked the world. In the 1980s, Chinese scientists discovered a group of Cambrian animal fossils in the Chengjiang Hat Tianshan Mountains, opening up the early Cambrian world that had been sleeping for 530 million years. This discovery has been called one of the most astonishing scientific discoveries of the 20th century.
The discovery of the Chengjiang animal fossil group strongly proves that in the Cambrian Period more than 500 million years ago, the earth ushered in an unprecedented explosion of life. In a very short time, from the lower sponges to the higher vertebrates, the ancestors of all modern biological phylums have emerged.
Chen Taimin, director of the World Natural Heritage Museum of Chengjiang Fossil Land: Micro-mesh insects are leaf-legged animals, the earliest long-legged animals on the earth. Fuxian Lake Worm, which belongs to arthropods, is the ancestor of these insects on our earth today. The Kunming fish is our town treasure because it is the earliest vertebrate we have found so far, and it basically has the structure of our basic human organs today.
Kunming fish is the first known organism to evolve the brain, spine and heart, it can be said that the human ancestor appeared in the Cambrian Period, from which it began a long evolution from fish to man.
Not only that, a large predator that dominates the ocean, the odd shrimp, also appeared in this explosion. It's hard for people today to believe that a shrimp can have such a deterrent.
The emergence of the odd shrimp opened the prelude to the predatory of the weak, the competition of marine life became unprecedentedly fierce, and the complex food chain began to be established, which triggered the evolution of life that climaxed in the next 500 million years.
Chen Taimin, director of the World Natural Heritage Museum of Chengjiang Fossil Land: Chengjiang has discovered more than 280 species in 20 doors, covering the ancestors of all living animals today, which marks the time of the Cambrian explosion, which produced the Earth animal lineage tree. Such a large tree branches and leaves, to have today's biodiversity look.
The Luoping Biota: Witnessing the Nirvana of Life
Continuing along the timeline, we travel from the Cambrian to the end of the Permian, about 250 million years from now, where the Paleozoic and Mesozoic dynasties meet. After the tree of life erupted in the ocean, it grew all the way. By this time, however, frequent crustal movements had caused the worst mass extinctions in history, wiping out almost all life phenomena from Earth. The relay of life breaks here. How long did it take for Nirvana to be reborn? In 2007, Chinese scientists found a fish fossil in Luoping, Yunnan, and gradually solved this answer.
Zhang Qiyue, head of the Luoping biota team at the Chengdu Geological Survey Center of the China Geological Survey: The place where the first fish fossil of the Luoping biota was found has now become a fossil ingestion for us. In order to systematically study the sea level changes and the status of fossil epiphysis, we have conducted a detailed study and numbering of rock layers, don't look at these numbers, it is of great significance, each fine layer has experienced tens of thousands of years of historical vicissitudes.
Zhang Qiyue, head of the Luoping biota team of the Chengdu Geological Survey Center of the China Geological Survey: A special paleogeographic environment preserved by the Luoping biota is that it has a large number of volcanic eruptions, this volcanic ash, and then there is a volcanic activity here, and the layer of volcanic ash below is more characteristic, so this area indicates that the volcanic activity was more frequent at that time.
Well-preserved fish fossils are excellent evidence for understanding the recovery of life after the mass extinction in the late Permian.
Researcher Zhang Qiyue, head of the Luoping biota team at the Chengdu Geological Survey Center of the China Geological Survey: The fish's teeth, scales and fins are all intact, which is related to the sudden burial of volcanic ash. We have found 86 species in 8 phyla 40 genera. Of these, 60 were first discovered and named in Ropin.
In this revival of life, the main creatures that occupied the ocean for nearly 300 million years have since decayed and disappeared, giving way to new species. The ecosystem has also received a most thorough update, paving the way for the evolution of reptiles such as dinosaurs. The scientific community generally believes that this mass extinction is a milestone in the transition of Earth's history from the Paleozoic to the Mesozoic.
Researcher Li Jianxing, deputy director of the Chengdu Geological Survey Center of the China Geological Survey: It is precisely because of our discovery and study of the Luoping biota that we learned that marine life in the Triassic period recovered normally after 8 million years after extinction, and later including dinosaurs also grew up after this. It can be said that the Luoping biota gives us a new understanding of the rebirth of Nirvana after the extinction of the earth's organisms, so as to cherish the unprecedented biodiversity on the earth.
Source CCTV News Client
Edited by Huang Pinchao
Process Editor Wu Yue