The Quarter-Billion-Year-Old Dinosaur

The details have yet to be confirmed, but according to a report in the respected German news magazine Der Spiegel, paleontologists in that country have unearthed the remains of a dinosaur in 250-million-year-old rock. What would make this an astonishing find is that the earliest true dinosaurs are thought to have evolved 235 million years ago--which would place the advent of these creatures at the start, rather than the middle, of the Triassic period.

So what's 15 million years in the grand scheme of things? Well, if dinosaurs really did evolve that early, it may prompt some rethinking of their relationship with archosaurs--the primitive, splay-footed, terrestrial reptiles that preceded the dinosaurs, and that also gave rise to pterosaurs and crocodiles. Stay tuned for more details!