Next-generation paleornithology: Technological and methodological advances allow new insights into the evolutionary and ecological histories of living birds

Abstract

Paleornithology, the study of fossil or ancient bird remains, provides an important context for understanding the biology, evolutionary history, and ecology of living birds. Recent technological and methodological advances in the field of paleornithology have opened up the potential to extract new pools of information from fossil bird remains, and hence provide new insights into the histories of living birds. Here we review some of these advances, covering aspects of ancient DNA and protein analyses, sedimentary proxies for birds, stable isotope analyses, coprolite analyses, high-resolution computed tomography, paleoneurology, finite elements analysis, and paleohistology. These new advances offer exciting prospects for the future of paleornithology, but also reaffirm the importance of basic fieldwork, exploration and the discovery of new fossil specimens, museum archives in which to curate the specimens, and traditional morphological approaches to studying the fossil remains.