Abstract
In 2015 a Chinese paleontologist came across a "once in a lifetime" find-what he claims is a feathered dinosaur tail encased in amber from 99 million years ago. The fossil is about 1.4 inches (3.6 cm) long, and tiny feathers are attached to an estimated eight vertebrae. Such finds are always excited because they provide new details about long-dead creatures that more typical fossils like bones and teeth don't preserve. But can scientists be sure they have found proof, at last, that dinosaurs had feathers and were the predecessors of birds?