![]() “With this detail, we’re able to look at the fossil from any angle, and make sure that the bones are in their right place,” says study coauthor Rodrigo Pêgas, a paleontologist at the Federal University of ABC in São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil. Gorillas, orangutans, and chimpanzees also have opposable thumbs. So the team used micro-CT scanning to create a 3-D rendering of the fossil. Monkeydactyl’s fossilized remains, unearthed in northeastern China in 2019, are embedded in rock. The latter half of the creature’s official name, Kunpengopterus antipollicatus, comes from the words “opposite” and “thumb” in ancient Greek. Humans have an opposable thumb, meaning that they are able to simultaneously flex, abduct and medially rotate the thumb (pollex) so as to bring its tip into. Such dexterity probably allowed Monkeydactyl to climb trees about 160 million years ago, perhaps to feed on insects and other prey that nonclimbing pterosaurs did not, the researchers say ( SN: 12/21/18). Future Jurassic Park films could feature one weird new beast in the menagerie: a pterosaur nicknamed Monkeydactyl for its opposable thumbs. ![]() This flying reptile from the Jurassic Period may be the earliest known animal that could touch the insides of its thumbs to the insides of its other fingers, researchers report online April 12 in Current Biology. Future Jurassic Park films could feature one weird new beast in the menagerie: a pterosaur nicknamed Monkeydactyl for its opposable thumbs.
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