Who knew that Donald Duck and T. rex were birds of a feather?

A new exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History shows the evolutionary links between dinosaurs and their closest living relatives — birds.

In 1996, paleontologists discovered dinosaur fossils containing feathers. Mark Norell, the exhibit’s curator, says it’s the key thread between these two animal groups.

“If something has feathers, you know that it’s a bird,” Norell says. “In addition, dinosaurs and birds share a lot of behavioral characteristics like nest brooding and sleeping posture. You could say that dinosaurs never really left us.”

While the exhibit contains more than 30 life-size dino models showcasing their common ancestry with birds, we picked four of our favorites:

• Yutyrannus huali

  

  While these 6-foot-tall dinosaurs were too big to fly, they sported a shaggy coat of hollow filaments. Over millions of years, this shape evolved into the modern feather we know today.

• Tianyulong

  

  These fuzzy dinos were dubbed the distant relative of birds when fossil hunters found traces o wispy feathers along the fossils of the animal’s neck, back and tail.

• Psittacosaurus

  

  This small-horned reptile is nicknamed “parrot lizard” after its curved beak. Its strangest feature? A brush of long bristles along its tail. Scientists say these fibers are an early stage of feather evolution.

• Citipati osmolskae

  

  Scientists uncovered this dinosaur’s remains in a peculiar position: Its forearms were spread across its nest to protect its eggs from the cold. Falcons today assume this position when brooding their eggs.