Artist’s reconstruction of the nesting ground of Hypacrosaurus stebingeri. A deceased Hypacrosaurus nestling can be seen with the back of its skull embedded in shallow waters. The mother is portrayed at right.
[the authors] With With our deepest regrets to the Jurassic Park franchise, DNA does not preserve well, and no genetic data has ever been recovered for dinosaurs. Recent news suggesting that scientists have found dinosaur DNA certainly sounds exciting, but it’s an extraordinary claim that warrants skepticism. Fossils of baby duck-billed dinosaurs ( Hypacrosaurus stebingeri
) have yielded traces of proteins, chromosomes, and chemical markers of DNA, according to new
put out by the Science China Press — the scientists, led by Alida Bailleul from the Chinese Academy of Science in Beijing, China, have not actually found dinosaur DNA, but rather materials that are chemically consistent with the presence of DNA . It’s kind of coded language, but it’s an important distinction, and, quite unfortunately, some media outlets have perhaps read too much into the press release.
“I couldn’t believe it, my heart almost stopped beating,” said Bailleul in the press release. [the authors] To see if the original molecules were also preserved, the researchers performed immunological and histochemical analyzes of another fossil, also of a nestling Hypacrosaurus found at the same site. When exposed to antibodies of collagen II (the main component of cartilage), the fossilized cartilaginous matrix appeared to react, hinting at the presence of the dinosaur’s original cartilaginous proteins.
something similar in for bone-forming cells (osteocytes), but this is the first such molecular response shown in fossilized cartilage.
This is not the first time that Schweitzer has claimed to have uncovered fossilized traces of soft tissue. In addition to the aforementioned (study, Schweitzer has presented evidence of
collagen in T. rex fossils and protein fragments in h adrosaurs , among other research papers.
in which he’s listed as first author.
, said skeptics “can say what they want,” but they need to come up with other explanations that fit the data better.
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