T. Rex Protein Analysis Supports Dinosaur-Bird Link 242
LanMan04 writes "For the first time, researchers have read the biological signature of a Tyrannosaur — a signature that confirms the increasingly accepted view that modern birds are the descendants of dinosaurs. Analyzing the organic material (collagen protein) found inside the unique fossil linked the collagen to several extant species. The bottom line is that the T. rex's biological signature was most like a bird's, at least based on the first fragmentary data. "It looks like chicken may be the closest among all species that are present in today's databases for proteins and genomes," one of the scientists interviewed said."
Re:Source of protein (Score:5, Informative)
Organic preservation like this is still believed to be a rare phenominon, but I'd expect many more ancient fossils to be inspected for organic remains from now on. Too bad DNA is as unstable in the long term as it is, though.
Re:Speaking of Jurassic Park... (Score:3, Informative)
John Ostrom of Yale University definitely supported the theory that birds might have evolved from a theropod dinosaur branch back in the early 1980's, I believe. Dr. Ostrom's ideas were then popularized by the publication of Dr. Robert Bakker's book "The Dinosaur Heresies", which is an interesting, colorful read, although admittedly Bakker doesn't always stick strictly to the science and he seems to rely too heavily on cladistic studies which don't take chronologies into consideration.
John Horner's "Digging Dinosaurs" was published not long after "The Dinosaur Heresies" and documents Horner's excavation of fossilized maiasaur nests containing crushed eggshells and bones of juvenile animals with incompletely developed joints, suggesting that they stayed in the nests and were cared for, similar to the way modern birds care for their hatchlings.
In the book "Jurassic Park" it is quite clear that Michael Crichton was aware of the work of Ostrom, Bakker and Horner, and in fact it seemed to me that he modeled his character Alan Grant after John Horner.
Regarding the size of the velociraptors in "Jurassic Park", at the time of its publication I don't recall that any six-foot-tall velociraptors had been discovered. However, a closely related species, Deinonychus, was known at the time, and it actually fits Crichton's description better than the velociraptors that were originally excavated in Asia.
Also, for anyone interested and close enough to visit, Peabody Museum in New Haven, CT has two Deinonychus models (I don't think they're original fossils, which would be quite rare) on display in its great room.
Re:Research confirms Chicken-Human Link! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Source of protein (Score:2, Informative)
If you get the drift, it's incompatible with science -- which is a systematic accumulation of principles and theories based on facts.
Re:Research confirms Chicken-Human Link! (Score:3, Informative)
You can always read articles to see what they say before you ask questions and make clueless conclusions. If you had read the original article you would see that they extract seven protein sequences from fossilized T. Rex tissue, then compared it to a number of modern and ancient organisms.
So there you go.Re:Did Someon Call the Skeptic? (Score:3, Informative)
I'm not sure whether pure mathematicians would consider the EA to be a proper member of their field. The outcome of an algorithm is rarely predictable, with randomness and approximation being the cornerstones of the art. They do borrow from, and are therefore related to, other fields, like physics (simulated annealing), and economics (Multi-Objective Optimisation).
Still, they are, in my opinion, something that would have to be abandoned/rejected if one were to adopt a short sighted creationist view.
Here's a funny thing. If fundamentalists got their way and we rejected evolution and other sciences in favour of religious explanations, the doctrine of creationism would probably lead into the inevitability of extinction.
Re:Speaking of Jurassic Park... (Score:1, Informative)
There are several convergent examples of vertebrates with legs beneath the body. Sinapsids and and diapsids diverged long before picking up that trait. In addition, crocodilia evolved the trait convergently to the dinosaurs; the splayed walk is an advanced feature in crocodilia.
Original article (Score:3, Informative)
Here is it:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/316/58
Protein Sequences from Mastodon and Tyrannosaurus Rex Revealed by Mass Spectrometry
Here is a choice quote:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/31
Analyses of Soft Tissue from Tyrannosaurus rex Suggest the Presence of Protein
Re:Did Someon Call the Skeptic? (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, we can trace the descent of modern automobiles from horse-drawn carriages by an elaborative process that in some respects resembles evolution, although because there was an intelligence behind the process it was far less wasteful than evolution by unintelligent variation and natural selection. The evolution of designed things is so efficient that companies had to introduce artificial extinctions in the form of model years to keep the number of new species high enough that people could be induced to buy cars more often than once a decade or so.
That said, yes, convergent evolution does occur--there is an example of an extra vertebra in some tropical species of newts that DNA sequencing has shown to have evolved at least twice quite recently in species that are more-or-less unrelated. But I was not aware that the basic body plan of dinosaurs and mammals had evolved more than once, although an AC replied to my original post saying that in fact it had, and the splayed legs of modern reptiles is in some cases a relatively recent feature.
The exception that proves the rule (Score:3, Informative)
"When Schweitzer demineralized the T. rex bone, she was surprised to find such a matrix, because current theories of fossilization held that no original organic material could survive that long."
The thought of course that the original material isn't all that old goes against the "old age" dogma of evolutionists and isn't even brought up as a possibility. If the creationists are right, who assert that the long ages of millions of years in reality are only thousands, then Dr. Mary Schweitzer would not need be surprised. It is well established that living matter can be preserved for thousands of years, but not millions.
This fossil is literally the ONLY FOSSIL EVER FOUND from millions of years ago that contains intact protein structures.
MILLIONS of other fossils of similar age found around the world have never shown any such thing. But the geology and chemistry of the location where this fossil was found explain why it was exceptionally well-preserved.
If it's really only thousands of years old, then you have to explain why no other dinosaur fossils ever found, anywhere, have shown protein preservation.