Brain Evolution Explains Why Birds Lay Larger Eggs Than Dinosaurs

Buried in the proportions of eggs and skulls, across millions of years of vertebrate life, a quiet logic has been waiting to be read: the larger the brain, the greater the cost of each new life brought into the world. Researchers from the American Museum of Natural History and Princeton University have found that birds lay disproportionately large eggs not despite being smaller than their dinosaur ancestors, but because their brains grew larger — demanding more energy per offspring and fewer offspring in return. The discovery reframes some of paleontology's most celebrated fossils and suggests