Fossil pigments reveal the colors of ancient sea monsters
Wednesday, January 8, 2014 - 17:50
in Paleontology & Archaeology
During the Age of the dinosaurs, huge reptiles, such as mosasaurs and ichthyosaurs, ruled the seas. Previously, scientists could only guess what colors these spectacular animals had; however, pigment preserved in fossilized skin has now been analyzed. The unique soft tissue remains were obtained from a 55 million-year-old leatherback turtle, an 85 million-year-old mosasaur and a 196–190 million-year-old ichthyosaur. This is the first time that the color scheme of any extinct marine animal has been revealed.