Discovery and Controversy (1987-1999)
In 1987, a bird fossil was discovered by a farmer in western Liaoning, China, in the ZijianJi Jiufotang Formation formation in Shengli Township, Chaoyang County, which is the earliest bird fossil found in western Liaoning. This discovery has attracted the attention and high praise of paleontologists around the world, calling it a "revolutionary discovery" and "the most significant discovery in the pre-paleontological world in the 20th century", which is no less than the Xi'an Terracotta Warriors that Shaanxi farmers inadvertently discovered.
Beginning in 1988, a large number of psittaciosaurs were discovered in the Rehe biota, and of the nine species of Psittacosaurus found around the world, the Rehe biota accounted for three of them: Meller Camp Parrot-billed Dragon, Lujiatun Psittacosaurus, and Large Parrot-billed Dragon.
In 1991, the results of the research of Chinese scientists Professor Rao Chenggang and American dinosaur expert Sechenol on the three-tower Chinese bird were published in the "Science" journal Lideng in the United States, and the results of the research of Yanduhua Fu bird by Chinese scholar Zhou Zhonghe and others were published in the "Science Bulletin", which opened the prelude to the climax of the research on the Rehe biota.
In 1995, in a paper entitled "The First Discovery of Zhuluo Bird Fossils in China" published by China's ancient bird experts Hou Lianhai, Zhou Zhonghe and others in the "Scientific Bulletin", the sage Confucius bird was named. It was the world's first pecking bird. Some scholars believe that the Confucius bird is the second Jurassic bird fossil found in more than 100 years.
In 1996, the original Chinese dragon bird was named by Ji Qiang, then director of the Geological Museum of China, who believed that the Chinese dragon bird was the true ancestor of birds, which caused great controversy. But in any case, the discovery of the Chinese dragon bird and the subsequent discovery of other species of feathered dinosaurs in the Rehe biota prove a major scientific hypothesis that birds evolved from dinosaurs.
In 1997, the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences carried out the first large-scale field excavation in the western Liaoning region, and since then, a large number of precious paleovertebrate fossils such as ancient birds and hairy dinosaurs have been discovered regularly every year.
In the same year, the discovery and naming of the five-pointed Zhanghe beast opened a new prelude to the study of primitive mammals in western Liaoning.
In 1998, the first piece is considered to be the world's oldest angiosperm, after the publication of a research paper on Liaoning Guguo. It has been shown that the era of Liaoning Guguo is not the earliest, and its angiosperm nature is controversial, but the publication of this article has triggered a boom in in-depth discovery and research of angiosperms in the Rehe biota.
In the same year, the first paper on the accurate layer order and fossil position of the projectile excavation in the Sihetun area was published, which was of great guiding significance for later excavations.
In 1998, a detailed study of the original Chinese dragon bird was published. The original Chinese dragon bird was revised to be a theropod dinosaur with primitive feathers. In the same year, studies of Zou's tail feathered dragons and stout primitive ancestral birds confirmed that theropod dinosaurs already had real feathers. Since then, it is an indisputable fact that dinosaurs have also grown feathers.
In the same year, the discovery of the flower insect Jurassic reticulated winged fly and so on showed the characteristics of the co-evolution of insects and angiosperms in western Liaoning.
In 1999, the Millennium Chinese Bird Dragon (meaning "Chinese Bird Lizard"),, a feathered dinosaur of the Chilong family, was the fifth feathered dinosaur found in the Western Liaoning region.
In the same year, the occurrence of the ancient bird robbery incident in Liaoning highlighted the harm of fossil fraud in western Liaoning to scientific research. The US "National Geographic" magazine published an article titled "Did Tyrannosaurus Rex have long feathers", which reported on the relevant fossils unearthed in Western Liaoning, and later found that the fossils were fake and issued a statement to correct the error. The academic humiliation caused by the falsification of fossil patchwork has greatly shocked the international paleontological community.
In the same year, the hypothesis that Western Liaoning was a refuge for the relict biota was proposed. Sparked a discussion about the nature of the Rehe biota.
Stratigraphic isotope chronology in the same year identified the Rehe biota Confucius bird and feathered dinosaur as about 125 million years ago.
Excerpt from "Fossil Records - Rehe Biota and Yanliao Biota"