A 68-million-year-old skull fossil found in Antarctica has revealed the oldest known modern bird, which was likely related to the waterfowl that live by lakes and oceans today, according to new research.

In the icy wilderness of Antarctica, where glaciers now dominate the landscape, scientists have unearthed a fossil that rewrites the story of modern birds. The nearly complete skull of Vegavis iaai, a duck-sized bird that lived 69 million years ago,

Paleontologists have been arguing whether modern birds developed before or after the infamous asteroid for decades. Now, a team of researchers has analyzed a 69-million-year-old fossil belonging to the long-extinct bird Vegavis iaai that could put the discussion to rest.

The near-complete fossil skull, unearthed on Vega Island near the Antarctic Peninsula, reveals a bird that thrived in the challenging waters off Antarctica roughly 69 million years ago, just three million years before the dinosaur-killing asteroid impact.

A newly analysed fossil skull settles a palaeontological debate over Vegavis iaai, confirming it as a relative of ducks and geese that lived 69 million years ago

The new skull exhibits a long, pointed beak and a brain shape unique among all known birds previously discovered from the Mesozoic Era.

A near-perfect fossilized skull discovered in Antarctica reveals the bridge between prehistoric and modern birds, a new study has found. The fossil is a specimen of a species called Vegavis iaai, which lived around 69 million years ago – more than 2 million years before the mass extinction that wiped out all non-avian dinosaurs.

A new and nearly complete skull of Vegavis iaai discovered in Antarctica suggests that modern birds originated before the end-Cretaceous mass extinction.

A 69-million-year-old fossilized skull unearthed in Antarctica could rewrite the history of modern birds. The nearly complete skull belongs to Vegavis iaai, a prehistoric waterfowl species that lived alongside Tyrannosaurus rex at the end of the Cretaceous period.