Media Releases

Seed clue to how birds survived mass extinction

April 22, 2016

BBC News | Apr. 21, 2016

Mod­ern birds owe their sur­vival to ances­tors who were able to peck on seeds after the mete­or that wiped out most dinosaurs, say sci­en­tists. “After this mete­or, you’re left with essen­tial­ly a nuclear win­ter where real­ly not much is grow­ing, the plants aren’t able to grow to pro­vide nour­ish­ment for plant-eaters and then meat-eaters aren’t able to access plant-eaters if they’ve all per­ished,” said lead researcher Derek Lar­son, from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to. Read more.