Dinosaurs: The fossils have now been confirmed to be of a rhamphorhynchine pterosaur.
Santiago:
Chilean scientists have announced the discovery of the first Southern Hemisphere remains of a type of Jurassic-era “winged lizard” known as a pterosaur.
Dinosaur fossils that lived in the Atacama Desert about 160 million years ago were discovered in 2009.
They have now been confirmed to be a rhamphorhynchine pterosaur – the first to be found in Gondwana, the prehistoric supercontinent that later formed the landmass of the Southern Hemisphere.
University of Chile researcher Jhontan Alarcón said the creatures had wingspans of up to two meters, a long tail and a pointed snout.
“We show that the distribution of animals in this group was wider than has been known to date,” he said.
The discovery was also “the oldest known pterosaur found in Chile”, scientists reported in the scientific journal Acta Paleontological Polonica.
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