Dinosaur embryo found curled up and ready to hatch from fossilised egg.

 Extract from ABC News

Posted 18 hours ago

An artist's impression of the entire, close-to-hatching oviraptorosaur dinosaur embryo that was found in Ganzhou, southern China.(AFP: University of Birmingham )

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Scientists have announced the discovery of an exquisitely preserved dinosaur embryo from at least 66 million years ago that was preparing to hatch from its egg just like a baby chicken.

Key points:

• An embryo fossil that has been named "Baby Yingliang" was forgotten about in storage for decades
• Dinosaur embryos are some of the rarest fossils 
• This specimen provides new insights into the link between dinosaurs and modern birds

The fossil was discovered in Ganzhou, southern China, and belonged to a toothless theropod dinosaur, or oviraptorosaur, which the researchers dubbed "Baby Yingliang".

It was one of several egg fossils that had been forgotten, in storage, for decades.

The research team suspected the fossils might have contained unborn dinosaurs, and scraped off part of Baby Yingliang's eggshell to uncover the embryo hidden within.

"It is one of the best dinosaur embryos ever found in history," researcher Fion Waisum Ma said.

"Dinosaur embryos are some of the rarest fossils and most of them are incomplete, with the bones dislocated.

"We are very excited about the discovery of 'Baby Yingliang' — it is preserved in a great condition and helps us answer a lot of questions about dinosaur growth and reproduction with it," she said. 

Researchers say this embryo was found without much disruption from fossilisation.(AFP: University of Lyon/Romain Amiot)

Professor Steve Brusatte was a part of the research team that made the discovery, and he said the embryo looked like "a baby bird curled in its egg".

"This dinosaur embryo, inside its egg, is one of the most beautiful fossils I have ever seen," he said. 

Embryo's link to modern birds 

Ms Ma and her colleagues found Baby Yingliang's head lying below its body, with its feet on either side and back curled, a posture that was previously unseen in dinosaurs but similar to modern birds.

In birds, the behaviour is controlled by the central nervous system and called "tucking".

Chicks preparing to hatch, tuck their head under their right wing to stabilise the head while cracking their shell with their beak.

Embryos that fail to tuck have a higher chance of death from unsuccessful hatching.

"This indicates that such behaviour in modern birds first evolved and originated among their dinosaur ancestors," Ms Ma said. 

An artist's impression of the embryo of a dinosaur that belongs to a feathered group known as oviraptorosaurs that lived during the Late Cretaceous period. (Supplied: University of Birmingham/Julius Csotonyi)

Baby Yingliang measures around 27 centimetres in length, from head to tail, and lies inside a 17-centimetre long egg at the Yingliang Stone Nature History Museum.

Researchers believe the creature is between 66 and 72 million years old, and was probably preserved by a sudden mudslide that buried the egg, protecting it from scavengers for eons.

It would have grown 2-3-metres in length if it had lived to be an adult, and would have likely fed on plants.

The team hopes to study Baby Yingliang in greater detail using advanced scanning techniques to image its entire skeleton, including its skull bones, because part of the body is still covered by rock.

AFP/ABC