The Chicago Sun-Times reports that a new study of bird DNA will likely have a major impact on our understanding of bird evolution and scientific classification.  Excerpts and link:

The five-year study — in which two Field Museum evolutionary biologists took part — is expected to transform conventional thinking about how birds evolved, those involved in the project say.

“It pretty much flies in the face, no pun intended, of the traditional thoughts of how birds are related,” said Sushma Reddy, a Field Museum scientist and one of the lead authors of the study.

Scientists spent the last five years examining the DNA of all major living bird groups, Reddy said. Recent technological advances made the mammoth study possible, said Shannon Hackett, another Field Museum scientist involved in the study.

The study results are so broad that the scientific names of dozens of birds will have to be changed, said Greg Borzo, a museum spokesman. Biology textbooks and birders’ field guides will also need to be revised, he said.

Among the more astounding discoveries: Falcons are not, as previously thought, closely related to hawks and eagles; tropicbirds — white, swift-flying ocean birds — aren’t closely related to pelicans and other birds; and the tiny, jewel-bright hummingbird evolved from the drab, nocturnal nightjar.

Reddy said the rearranging of the avian evolutionary tree is as shocking as someone discovering their cousin is actually their brother.

More here…

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/1027470,CST-NWS-birds27.article

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