70 million year-old perfectly preserved dinosaur embryo discovered curled up inside its egg in China, has been named Baby Yingliang

 

• The fossilized embryo is 70 million years old

• It has been named "Baby Yingliang"

• Dinosaurs fossilized embryo found by Paleontologist in Jiangxi province China

• Finding embryonic dinosaur fossils are extremely rare

source: WANG DONGMING/CHINA NEWS SERVICE VIA GETTY

On 21 Dec 2021, an extremely rare fossil of a complete baby dinosaur curled up inside its 6-inch elongated eggshell was found by Paleontologists in Jiangxi province of Southern China.

The 70-million-year-old fossil preserves the embryonic skeleton of an oviraptorid dinosaur, which has been nicknamed Baby Yingliang after the name of the Chinese Stone Nature History Museum,  which houses the fossil.  

According to a recently developed study, the fossil showed the remarkable similarities between theropod dinosaurs and the birds they would evolve into, at this stage, the embryo looks like that of a modern bird, but it has small arms and claws rather than wings.

The egg is about 17cm(7inches) long and the baby dinosaur curled inside it is estimated to have a length of 27cm(11 inches) from head to tail. Researchers said had it lived, it would have grown as an adult of about 2m to 3m long. Finding embryonic dinosaur fossils are extremely rare, with such discoveries being limited to only about half a dozen sites. And, this is the first time any of them has shown signs of “tucking,” a distinctive posture usually followed by modern baby birds during hatching when the head is under the right arm, paleontologists said.

An unprecedented fossil of a baby dinosaur found in Jiangxi province, ended up in storage for about 10 years, when Yingliang Stone Nature History Museum staff sorted the boxes and found it. 

University of Birmingham researcher Fion Waisum Ma, the lead author of a paper in the journal iScience, said, "This discovered fossilized embryo  belonged to a toothless theropod dinosaur, or oviraptorosaur. We were surprised to see this embryo beautifully preserved inside a dinosaur egg, lying in a bird-like posture. This posture had not been recognised in non-avian dinosaurs before. Though most known non-avian dinosaur embryos are incomplete with skeletons disarticulated (bones separated at the joints), It is one of the best dinosaur embryos ever found in history."

Professor Steve Brusatte, of the University of Edinburgh, said: “This dinosaur embryo inside its egg is one of the most beautiful fossils I have ever seen. 

“This little prenatal dinosaur looks just like a baby bird curled in its egg, which is yet more evidence that many features characteristic of today’s birds first evolved in their dinosaur ancestors.”

Image shows what the dinosaur might have looked like inside its egg, photo:AFP

He was part of a team, including scientists from the University of Birmingham and China University of Geosciences (Beijing) along with researchers from institutions in China, the UK and Canada, whose findings on the discovery have been published in the iScience  journal, this week.

Whereas, study co-author and associate professor Darla Zelenitsky said baby dinosaur bones are small and fragile and are only very rarely preserved as fossils, making this a very lucky find. "It is an amazing specimen. I have been working on dinosaur eggs for 25 years and have yet to see anything like it," added Zelenitsky in an email to CNN.

"Up until now, little has been known of what was going on inside a dinosaur's egg prior to hatching, as there are so few embryonic skeletons, particularly those that are complete and preserved in a life pose," she added.

The researchers from China, the UK and Canada studied the positions of Baby Yingliang and other previously found oviraptorid embryos. They concluded that the dinosaurs were moving and changing poses before hatching in a way similar to baby birds.

University of Birmingham's Press Office tweeted about the discovered fossilized dinosaur embryo on Tuesday.

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

The fossil was found in China's Jiangxi province and acquired in 2000 by Liang Liu, a director of a Chinese stone company called Yingliang Group. It ended up in storage, largely forgotten until about 10 years later, when museum staff sorted through the boxes and discovered the specimens of fossil embryos during the construction of Yingliang Stone Nature History Museum. The museum is subsidized by the company.