Tag Archive for 'Dinilysia patagonica'

Life reconstruction of Tametara mirim. Image credit: Gabriel Ugueto.

Did Early Snakes Burrow, Swim or Crawl? 80‑Million‑Year‑Old Fossil Suggests: All Three

Jul 23, 2026 by Enrico de Lazaro

Paleontologists have unearthed a remarkably preserved fossil snake in Brazil that is reshaping ideas about how the earliest snakes lived and complicating...

Artistic representation of the opportunistic burrowing behavior of the hypothetical ancestor of crown snakes, as predicted from reconstructed high-definition 3D whole-brain models (highlighted middle right) shown in dorsal (top) and lateral (bottom) views. In comparison, the reconstruction of the first natural endocast of a fossil snake (Dinilysia patagonica, top right) displays a divergent morphological configuration of the telencephalon (Tel) and provides no or limited information about the diencephalon (Dien), mesencephalon (Mes), cerebellum (Cb), and medulla oblongata (MO) regions. In contrast, the estimated endocast of Najash rionegrina (bottom right) shows similarities with the hypothetical ancestor of crown snakes in several distinguishable telencephalic regions, including cerebral hemisphere (CH), olfactory bulb (OB), and olfactory tract (OT). Reconstructions of the fossil skulls (purple color) are shown around the cranial endocasts. Image credit: Macrì et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adi6888 / Neptalí Ramírez Marcial.

Researchers Shed New Light on Enigmatic Early Evolution of Snakes

Oct 3, 2023 by News Staff

The ecological origin and early evolution of snakes has long been a focus of multiple research fields and remains one of the most enduring and controversial...

Artist’s restoration of Dinilysia patagonica. Image credit: Nobu Tamura, spinops.blogspot.com / CC BY-SA 3.0.

90-Million-Year-Old Fossil Provides Clues about How Snakes Evolved

Nov 27, 2015 by Enrico de Lazaro

A new analysis of the Cretaceous fossil Dinilysia patagonica is helping paleontologists solve an old scientific puzzle – how ancient snakes lost...