By: Emma Xing

Back in 2021, museum curator Kevin Petersen discovered fossilized bones that were 100 million years old. These bones belonged to the newfound species called pterosaurs.

The pterosaur’s fossilized bones were found in the Australian state, Queensland. Before the species received the name pterosaur, they were called Haliskia Petersini, named after Kevin Petersen.

What exactly is a pterosaur? Many people would think that this is a type of dinosaur. However, it is not. Pterosaurs were prehistoric flying reptiles that had birdike-beaks and wings. They lived about 65 to 225 million years ago. There are a total of 200 different species of pterosaurs, including one that has a 35-foot wingspan! Although pterosaurs existed during the times of dinosaurs and had a common ancestor, pterosaurs are definitely not dinosaurs.

To learn more about pterosaurs, a research team from Curtin University examined the fossilized bones of the pterosaur. They analyzed the shape of its skull, shoulder bones, and teeth. With their gained information, the researchers classified pterosaurs as an anhanguerian, a group of pterosaurs known to live across the world.

Adele Pentland, a PHD student who led the project stated, “With a wingspan of approximately 4.6 meters, Haliskia would have been a fearsome predator around 100 million years ago when much of central western Queensland was underwater, covered by a vast inland sea and globally positioned about where Victoria’s southern coastline is today.”

What will the next discovery of fossils be?