A new species of flying reptile reshuffles the timeline of pterosaur evolution

About 230 million years ago, almost 80 million years before the first bird appeared, their distantly related cousins, the pterosaurs took to the sky, as the first group of active fliers among the vertebrates. Pterosaurs developed active, flapping flight with the help of a wing membrane, which was mainly spanned by the strongly elongated fourth finger of the hand.