Unfortunately for dinosaur cloning proponents and Jurassic Park fans, researchers in Australia have concluded that bringing back the dinosaurs is a matter of Hollywood fiction. The Proceedings of the Royal Society B published a paper arguing that dinosaur DNA would not be viable after 65 million years of extinction.
With a half-life of 521 years, there is simply no way that even carefully preserved DNA would be fitting for extraction and collection, let alone cloning. The half-life indicates the time it takes for half of the DNA to break down, and with half of the DNA breaking down within 521 years, 65 million years is more than a bit of a stretch.
The scientists who reached this conclusion were using the mitochondrial DNA found in the fossilized bones of three extinct large bird species to examine DNA degradation. Radiocarbon-dating was used to determine that the fossils ranged in age from 6,000 to 8,000 years old.
The study revealed that a total breakdown of DNA occurs at 6.8 million years, and that number applies only to remains that are preserved in ideal conditions. Additionally, the DNA would become unreadable after about 1.5 million years due to the ongoing breakdown.
The authors of the paper did not conduct the study with the hope of dashing Hollywood's dinosaur cloning myth. The goal of the project was to determine ability of DNA to persist in bone samples.
Regardless of the researchers' intentions, the findings deal a crushing blow to the dream of resurrecting dinosaurs from fossilized bone or mosquitoes trapped in amber. Within the scientific community, there is still support for the idea that species that walked the earth more recently than dinosaurs might be candidates for cloning. Such species include wooly mammoths and Neanderthals.
.jpg "Dinosaurs Cloning") |
| Image Licensed Under Attribution |
Jack Horner, a paleontologist, has given support to the notion of basically engineering a dinosaur from chicken DNA. He notes that the result would actually be a modified chicken rather than an actual dinosaur, but Horner believes that the "chickenosaurus" can serve as a valuable learning tool.
Horner states that the modified chicken can help people become more educated about evolution, and he feels that unlocking the secrets of engineering the modified chicken can help researchers solve some medical mysteries that are linked to genetic causes.
Only the future will tell if scientists will engineer the chickenosaurus or resurrect the long dead wooly mammoth. For now, recent revelations about the half-life of DNA have firmly vanquished the possibility of cloning dinosaurs from preserved DNA samples.
A real life Jurassic Park is farther away than ever, but Hollywood and scientific exploration are bound to blaze new trails that will continue to push the boundaries of the known world.
Steven SandersAbout the Author:
Steven Sanders is a tech and science blogger and is passionate about sharing his knowledge with others. He recommends checking out this article to learn more about biological storage: The Amazing Technology Behind Cold Biological Storage Facilities.
