Dinosaurs’ ability to survive icy cold helped them dominate the planet

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Dinosaurs were able to endure freezing winters during the Late Triassic and earlyJurassic periods. They dominated the planet for 135 million years.

Dinosaur footprints have previously been found in the Junggar basin in north-west China, but new evidence shows that dinosaurs lived in both warm and cold forests.

The region regularly froze over at a time when it was inhabited by prehistoric reptile. Large particles are typical of lakes that freeze over time.

Dinosaur fossils have been found near the poles, but models suggesting that temperatures there dropped below freezing between 237 million years and 174.1 million years ago have been disputed, so no one knows if the reptile actually lived in cold conditions.

After large land and sea creatures were wiped out in the tropics, the dinosaurs were able to dominate Earth.

Read more: How Prehistoric Planet created scientifically accurate dinosaurs

Most medium and large continental reptile vanished at the end of the Triassic when temperatures plunged and eruptions clouded the air with sulphur. The adaptation of the polar dinosaurs to the cold probably explains why medium-large dinosaurs came back so quickly after this extinction event.

During the end-Triassic period, the dinosaurs were prepared for the cold, having survived feeding on polar vegetation and braving the cold with feathers. The dinosaurs took over the place of large non-insulated reptiles, which had been wiped out.

The latest evidence shows that our idea of dinosaurs needs to be reexamined. The paper shows that our view of the dinosaur world is wrong. Dinosaurs are not on the margins. They are not different from others. Dinosaurs are actually cold-adapted.

Science Advances is a journal published by Science Advances.

The revolution in archaeology and human evolution is covered in Our Human Story.