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T. Rex Protein Analysis Supports Dinosaur-Bird Link
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."
I remember sneering when it was brought up with tones of awe and wonder; I think it was accepted pretty commonly earlier than the movie suggested at the very least.
This sort of stuff always makes me laugh...The idea that bigass dino's like the T-Rex were slow and ungainly hunters...When does nature ever produce slow ungainly hunters? The selection is always for high speed or decent speed and endurance.
Saw a special about the first filming of the giant squid a few months ago (though it was an old documentary), and they were talking about how the theory had been that the giant squid was a lazy predator that just hung out with it's arms dangling, snagging things that drifted through them, and that what the film suggested was that it was a fast, energetic predator...They're saying this with awe, like it had never occurred to them that this could be the case, while showing film of smaller squids doing their lightning fast attacks.
In retrospect it seems silly to have ever believed that dinosaurs could have been anything like as slow as was commonly thought, but it's a mistake that is not uncommon.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I'm more curious about what methods they used to "isolate the collagen proteins". From my understanding ALL fossils are not the real bone or organic matter that the animal once was, but a mineral deposit in the shape of the once present organic material. So how did you get T.Rex dna out of a non-organic rock formed like a bone?
what I especially like about Jurassic park is that Speilberg decided they had to have six foot tall Velociraptors for the film, which was considered absurd, then within months six foot tall Velociraptor fossils were discovered.
I would love to know just how similar the proteins were. Here is interesting research showing how the human and chicken genomes are also very similar. http://www.livescience.com/animalworld/chicken_gen ome_041208.html
Not sure what the T-Rex data proves, other than lots of creatures have a similar genetic composition to a chicken. Guess this means that I'm "related" to a T-rex too, since I apparently came from a chicken...could explain my short arms and overbite.
I'm more interested in the fact that T-Rex soft tissue can survive for, supposedly, 65M years...