How did dinosaurs evolve to birds?

The gradual evolutionary change - from fast-running, ground-dwelling bipedal theropods to small, winged flying birds - probably started about 160 million years ago. It was possibly due to a move by some small theropods into trees in search of either food or protection.
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How did the dinosaurs turn into birds?

In becoming birds, dinosaurs had to change in many ways, including shrinking in size, sprouting wings, adapting feathers that were used for display and flight , improving their senses, shortening their tails, losing teeth, and many other characters.
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How did dinosaurs evolve into birds if they all died?

The beginning of birds

Birds evolved from a group of meat-eating dinosaurs called theropods. That's the same group that Tyrannosaurus rex belonged to, although birds evolved from small theropods, not huge ones like T. rex. The oldest bird fossils are about 150 million years old.
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How long did it take for dinosaurs to turn into birds?

It took 50 million years of continual shrinking to turn massive, lumbering dinosaurs into the first small flying birds.
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Did all dinosaurs turn into birds?

Henderson explains it, “all birds descended from dinosaurs but not all dinosaurs evolved into birds.” Dinosaurs (both non-avian and avian dinosaurs) and birds coexisted for millions of years before non-avian dinosaurs became extinct about 66 million years ago.
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How Did Dinosaurs Evolve Into Birds?



What is the closest thing to a dinosaur alive today?

Yes, birds are the closest living relatives of the dinosaurs because of several shared characteristics: Lay eggs: Like birds, dinosaurs built nests in which to lay eggs. Their young would hatch from these eggs. This way of reproduction is called oviparity.
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Are chickens related to T. rex?

The closest living relatives of Tyrannosaurus rex are birds such as chickens and ostriches, according to research published today in Science (and promptly reported in the New York Times). Paleontologists used material discovered in a chance find in 2003 to pin down the link.
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What is the closest animal to a dinosaur?

It is correct to say that birds are the closest living relatives to all EXTINCT dinosaurs. The closest living relatives of ALL dinosaurs are the crocodilians (crocodiles, alligators, gharials).
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How did birds survive while dinosaurs went extinct?

After the asteroid struck Earth long ago, all birds with teeth went extinct. But many of the toothless ones kept living. Some scientists think not having teeth is what allowed these birds to survive. Fossils of early toothless birds show they were able to eat more plant-based food – specifically nuts, fruits and seeds.
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What bird is closest to dinosaurs?

While all birds are descended from dinosaurs, the mysterious cassowary is thought to be more similar to ancient dinosaurs than most other birds. Large bodied with fierce claws, these flightless birds also have casques, a helmet-like structure atop the head, which many dinosaurs are believed to have had.
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Did humans exist with dinosaurs?

No! After the dinosaurs died out, nearly 65 million years passed before people appeared on Earth. However, small mammals (including shrew-sized primates) were alive at the time of the dinosaurs.
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Why did dinosaurs go extinct but not humans?

Dinosaur eggs underwent slow incubation periods, putting the newborn creatures and their parents at risk from predators and other environmental factors, new research has found. This could explain why the prehistoric animals could not reproduce fast enough after mass extinction, causing them to die out.
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Why didn't the dinosaurs come back?

Around 66 million years ago, at the end of the Cretaceous period, an asteroid struck the Earth, triggering a mass extinction that killed off the dinosaurs and some 75% of all species. Somehow mammals survived, thrived, and became dominant across the planet.
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Why did dinosaurs lose their teeth?

Unlike humans, which lose just one set of teeth over a lifetime, dinosaurs often lost tens or even hundreds of sets. Plant-eating dinosaurs had to chew lots of tough material to sustain their large bodies, causing them to frequently replace their teeth.
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Are there any proof dinosaurs are still alive?

In an evolutionary sense, birds are a living group of dinosaurs because they descended from the common ancestor of all dinosaurs. Other than birds, however, there is no scientific evidence that any dinosaurs, such as Tyrannosaurus, Velociraptor, Apatosaurus, Stegosaurus, or Triceratops, are still alive.
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Did any dinosaurs survive?

Alligators & Crocodiles: These sizeable reptiles survived–even though other large reptiles did not. Birds: Birds are the only dinosaurs to survive the mass extinction event 65 million years ago.
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When was the last dinosaur seen alive?

Dinosaurs went extinct about 65 million years ago (at the end of the Cretaceous Period), after living on Earth for about 165 million years.
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What was the last dinosaur alive?

He and all of the other researchers, however, suspect that more recent dinosaurs even closer to the K-T boundary will be found in the future. For now, however, the 65-million-year-old Triceratops is the world's last known surviving dinosaur.
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Can birds become dinosaurs again?

No bird in the past 66 million years has ever had teeth. Considering these huge differences, it's really unlikely birds will ever evolve to look more like their extinct dinosaur relatives. And no extinct dinosaur will ever come back to life either — except maybe in movies!
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What was on Earth before dinosaurs?

For approximately 120 million years—from the Carboniferous to the middle Triassic periods—terrestrial life was dominated by the pelycosaurs, archosaurs, and therapsids (the so-called "mammal-like reptiles") that preceded the dinosaurs.
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What is the oldest species on earth?

1. Sponge - 760 million years old.
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What was the first animal on earth?

The First Animals

Sponges were among the earliest animals. While chemical compounds from sponges are preserved in rocks as old as 700 million years, molecular evidence points to sponges developing even earlier.
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Why were dinosaurs so big?

Paleontologists don't know for certain, but perhaps a large body size protected them from most predators, helped to regulate internal body temperature, or let them reach new sources of food (some probably browsed treetops, as giraffes do today).
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What is the closest living thing to the T. rex?

To further their research, the chicken was the first bird to have its genome sequenced. This means that scientists found the particular order of their DNA. Doing this helped provide more evidence for scientists to confirm that the chicken is currently the closest living relative to the T-Rex.
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What did T. rex evolve from?

Researchers have long contended that Daspletosaurus, a rare species of theropod found in Montana, may have later evolved into T. rex.
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