A new kind of pterosaur, a flying reptile from the time of the
dinosaurs, has been identified by scientists from the
Transylvanian Museum Society in Romania, the University of
Southampton in the UK and the Museau Nacional in Rio de Janiero,
Brazil. The fossilised bones come from the Late Cretaceous rocks
of Sebes-Glod in the Transylvanian Basin, Romania, which are
approximately 68 million years old. The Transylvanian Basin is
world-famous for its many Late Cretaceous fossils, including
dinosaurs of many kinds, as well as fossilised mammals, turtles,
lizards and ancient relatives of crocodiles. A paper on the new
species, named Eurazhdarcho langendorfensis has been published
in the international science journalPLoS One. Dr Darren Naish,
from the University of Southampton’s Vertebrate Palaeontology
Research Group, who helped identify the new species, said:
“Eurazhdarcho belong to a group of pterosaurs called the
azhdarchids. These were long-necked, long-beaked pterosaurs
whose wings were strongly adapted for a