In China, the remains of an ancient bird with a "dinosaur head" were discovered

Paleontologists found in the north of China body prints of a previously unknown species of ancient birds Cratonavis zhui, which had a typically avian body and wings, but their skull was similar to a similar part of the body of dinosaurs.

These birds claim to be one of the "lost links in the evolution" of birds, the researchers write in an article in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution, writes "TASS".
"The study of the history of the appearance of birds and the search for the "lost links of their evolution" are now complicated by a small number of fossils of birds from the Pygostylia clade, to which all modern and ancient birds belong. We found in the deposits of the Early Cretaceous in Liaoning province the imprints of the body of Cratonavis zhui, a bird with a unique combination of a typically avian anatomy of the body and a primitive skull that would be more appropriate on the body of a dinosaur," the researchers write.
Over the past two decades, paleontologists' ideas about the appearance and history of the evolution of dinosaurs and the first birds have radically changed. Now scientists believe that almost all dinosaurs had plumage, many of them hatched eggs and cared for their offspring, and several species of ancient protoptites, such as Gansus yumenensis and Confuciusornis sanctus, now claim to be the "lost link" of evolution.