Recent discoveries in Middle–Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous deposits from northeastern China have revealed that numerous theropod dinosaurs were covered by feathers. Furthermore, filamentous integumentary structures were also recently described in rare Early Cretaceous ornithischian dinosaurs from Liaoning Province in China. Whether these filaments can be regarded as epidermal and therefore part of the evolutionary lineage towards feathers remains controversial. Here we describe a new basal neornithischian dinosaur, based on isolated bones and partial skeletons collected in two monospecific bonebeds from the Middle–Late Jurassic Kulinda locality in the Transbaikal region (Russia). Varied integumentary structures were found directly associated with skeletal elements, supporting the hypothesis that simple filamentous feathers, as well as compound feather-like structures comparable to those in theropods, were widespread amongst the whole dinosaur clade. Moreover, scales along the distal tibia and on the foot closely resemble the secondarily-appearing pedal scales in extant birds. More surprisingly, dorso-ventral movements of the tail were prevented by large imbricated scales on its dorsal surface. It is hypothesized that, at the same time early feathers evolved within the whole dinosaur clade, genetic mechanisms limiting the growth of long epidermal structures on the distal portion of the hind limb and on the tail were selected as they facilitate bipedal terrestrial locomotion.
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Due to climate change and new political reasons to use more sustainable energy forms (turning away from nuclear, coal and other non-renewable resources), alternative energy sources are needed. Therefore, the geothermal energy sector can become one of the important energy resources in the future. Geothermal energy (heat) is CO2-neutral, quasi-inexhaustible and available decentrally at any time and almost everywhere. The exploitation of deep geo-thermal resources for producing electricity is an important component for creating innovative and renewable energy systems, but the use of shallow (focus: up to 400 metres depth) and even very shallow (focus: up to 10 metres depth) geothermal potentials is also significant, e.g. for sustainable heating and cooling of residential and industrial buildings, etc. Furthermore in Europe, the installation and operation of very shallow heat collector systems is not as restricted by national and regional legislation as for deeper systems. Compared with the well-researched and already implemented solar, wind and hydropower domains, less research has been done into the of very shallow geothermal energy potential at the European level.
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