Fossils reveal link between dinosaurs and beetles which fed on feathers

Fossils have shown the link between feathered dinosaurs and feather-feeding beetles (CN IGME-CSIC/University of Oxford)

Beetles may have fed on the feathers of dinosaurs about 105 million years ago, fossils in amber have revealed.

The main amber fragments studied contain the shed skin (larval moults) of small beetle larvae tightly surrounded by portions of downy feathers.