Researchers from Mansoura University It has been identified On Tuesday, June 30, what is described as the first confirmed Egyptian record of pterosaurs, flying reptiles that dominated the skies 145 million years long before birds appeared, was released.
discovery, He drove It was produced by the Mansoura Center for Vertebrate Paleontology (Al-Salam Laboratory), in cooperation with the Egyptian Ministry of the Environment, the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, and the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in the United States.
The fossil consists of a rare diagnostic piece of a pterosaur wing: the first bone element associated with an extended fourth toe, excavated from Paleolithic rocks. Navy The formation is in the Western Desert near the Bahariya Oasis.
This specimen was found within ancient marine sediments, and provides the clearest direct evidence yet of pterosaurs He lived It flew into what is now northern Egypt during the Late Cretaceous period, about 95 million years ago.
Based on anatomical measurements, Researchers It is estimated that the pterosaur represented by the fossil was of medium size, with a wingspan of about four metres.
And also study He explains That pterosaur bones were generally thin-walled and lightweight, and adapted to flight, made them less susceptible to fossilization than the sturdier bones of many other groups.
This factor explains why the fossil record of pterosaurs across parts of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula remains limited and fragmentary, making Egyptian evidence particularly valuable.
Describing the importance of the discovery, the research team said Confirm Its scientific and personal importance.
Lead author Bilal Salem, a doctoral researcher at Ohio University and a member of the SLAM Lab research group, He explained The marine oasis was already known for its giant predators that dominated the land and its waterways, but the new fossil adds something completely new by providing clear evidence of the animals that ruled the skies.
The results were published on June 30, 2026 in Acta Paleontologica PolonicaIt represents an important step forward in vertebrate paleontology in Egypt and offers a new vision of a world where pterosaurs, among the first vertebrates to evolve powered flight, shared the landscape with dinosaurs for more than 150 million years, before eventually disappearing at the end of the Cretaceous.