Wings evolved to help birds run - not fly

FEATHERED WINGS evolved to help the first birds to run faster and only later were they used for flying, according to a study of how flight was invented.

The evidence comes from research into the earliest known flying bird, Archaeopteryx. Since last century scientists have debated whether Archaeopteryx flew by jumping from trees or executed running take-offs. But estimates of Archaeopteryx's fastest running speed suggested that, at two metres a second, it was too slow to achieve the required take-off velocity of six metres per second. But in a study published in Nature, two American scientists recalculated the running speed at nearly eight metres per second.