Science Visualized Animals

Hundreds of new genomes help fill the bird ‘tree of life’

Avian genetic toolkits could let scientists unravel 150 million years of evolutionary history

photograph of a roadrunner with a lizard in its beak

A greater roadrunner (Geococcyx californianus) catches a scaly snack. The bird is one of the animals whose genetic instruction book, or genome, has been assembled for the first time.

Brian Schmidt/Smithsonian

By Jake Buehler

From gulls to grouse to grackles, more than 10,000 bird species live on this planet. Now, scientists are one step closer to understanding the evolution of all of this feathered diversity.