A study of European dinosaurs has unveil something very dissimilar from what was pass off across the Atlantic at the clock time . The study support the hypothesis that the drastic loss of coinage at the oddment of the Cretaceous was a result of a single asteroid strike , rather than a combination of factor .
Although the idea ofdeath from abovehasgrabbedpopular imagination , many paleontologists believe that the story is more complex . While the asteroid emphatically seems to have delivered the coup de grâce , metal money were disappearingfor zillion of age beforehand , result to a lookup for more gradual influence , such as volcanic activity from theDeccan Traps .
It might be expected that this debate would be found on worldwide evidence , but in fact most field from the last part of the Cretaceouscome from North America . The geology of western Canada and the United commonwealth at the clip produced a plentiful store of fogy , and the locations are easy accessible to the major paleontological enquiry institutes .
However , both the Gallic and Spanish slope of the Pyrenees also have late Cretaceous specimens . By combining the findings from this region with those from Romania and less abundant land site , a team from five European nations has concluded that the same pre - star-shaped decline was not seen on that continent . The work has been published inZookeys .
" For a long time , Europe was shadow by other continent when the understanding of the nature , composition and phylogeny of belated Cretaceous continental ecosystem was come to . The last 25 years witnessed a huge effort across all Europe to improve our cognition , and now we are on the verge of fathoming the import of these new discoveries , and of the unknown and new account they recite about life at the end of the Dinosaur Era , " say lead author Dr. Zoltán Csiki - Sava of the University of Bucharest .
“ Although Europe had have some ecologic reorganization during the waning years of the Cretaceous , there is no strong evidence that dinosaurs and other organisms gradually waste off to experimental extinction , ” the writer reason out .
The paper also give away an interesting scene of the elbow room European animals , including dinosaur , mammal , turtles and crocodilians , diverged from those elsewhere . Europe was lower lie at this time , before collision with Africa lift parts of the continent , and the gamy ocean stage of the era work it into an archipelago of island . Isolation led to rapid variegation as species conform to local circumstances , although central continue with Gondwanaland , and between island during periods where ocean level declined .
One of the gist the writer abide by are cases ofisland dwarfismamong dinosaurs , such asMagyarosaurus , aTitanosaurthat does n’t know up to the name , being a modest six cadence long .
Credit : Verónica Díez Díaz / Csiki - Sava et al . Vertebrae from late Cretaceous European Titanosaurs , with Magyarosaurus at D.
The same fossil down payment are also revealing a traffic pattern of extermination andsurvival among mammal , reptilian and amphibious metal money across the Cretaceous / Paleogene edge , while local bird specie seem to have die out out entirely .
