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Experiment Will Determine Dinosaur's Skin Color
AchilleTalon writes "One of the only well preserved dinosaur skin samples ever found is being tested at the Canadian Light Source (CLS) synchrotron to determine skin color and to explain why the fossilized specimen remained intact after 70-million years. University of Regina physicist Mauricio Barbi said the hadrosaur, a duck-billed dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous period (100-65 million years ago), was found close to a river bed near Grand Prairie, Alberta."
Because this could also determine if they were feathered or not. No need for spectacular skin if feathered and probably need for colored skin if not feathered.
Disclaimer: Not an expert
It is unfortunate that realistic dinosaur costumes aren't nearly as interesting as they were before we did all the science, and figured out that they have feathers and whatnot.
...so far. I worry the next step will be MLP:FIM dinos... bah.
I like the creepy, lizard-like monstrosities. We've already gone from HR Giger dinosaurs to Jim Henson dinosaurs
- Nec Impar Pluribus, or so I'm told.
But there are many non-green reptiles as well, the gila monster being the most striking example.
In the past many think that Dinosaurs were most closely related to reptiles but we now know that Dinosaurs are most closely related to birds and thus may have the colour variations that one sees in birds rather than the colour variation seen in Lizards.
it's beige
You can't handle the truth.
Judge them by the content of their character?
...OMG Ponies! pink.
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
Does skin color really matter? Are we still not able to look past it?
Instead of knowing the color of their skin, I would be more interested in knowing the content of their character.
That's the old theory. Now that their connection with birds is gained more ground, scientists believe that many (if not all) dinosaur species were warm blooded.
Yes they are. Dinosauria is a clade under Reptilia. But they are more closely related to birds than they are to lizards, crocodiles and turtles (which we traditionally think of as reptiles).
No, AFAIK it was just conjecture at the time. There wasn't the DNA or knowledge of DNA to know what color the dinosaurs should be. This was also millions of years before Kodachrome so the only pictures we have are in black and white or various monochrome pigmentation.
Fortunately, with a skin sample we might learn what color one specific dinosaur was. But, it's safe to say that it was some sort of earth tone.
I would even say most reptiles arent green. And the ones that are can change color usually. Most reptiles are probably various shades of brown.
That way no myths are shattered, and I would always enjoy being terrified watching Jurassic Park
Otherwise, I'd have to lean over and tell my kids, They're probably out-of-work dinosaurs that hang out in empty Hollywood lots, waiting for the pickup truck to come get them. Same as those out-of-work 'bad ass' bikers waiting for a different pickup, but still waiting for that same type of call, for their next walk-on role.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
I'm pretty sure that the absence of any supporting evidence whatsoever disqualifies your hypotheses from the lofty title of "theory".
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
So are you saying that a Supersaurus was dexterous enough to roll around on the ground? This isn't a small Cat we're talking about here. Here we have a very large, very heavy Reptile-ish creature. We should all know by now that the larger something is, the less agile it can be. Even a Cat can't reach some points on it's body.
And this isn't a Bird, what use would a brightly colored Supersaurus be, it would be a target if anything. I'm sticking to what I said, I'm sure it was a darker shade. The examples you gave are for Poisonous creatures, they are brightly colored to indicate a warning to potential attackers. The defensive mechanism for a large Dino like the Supersaurus would have been it's sheer size, mess with me and I'll stomp you, sort of thing.
I mean come on, you're talking to a guy who devoted a small portion of his life to the grooming habits of Blattaria.
Yes, there is evidence. There is evidence that dinos sat on their eggs. A cold-blooded creature would not do that.
Anonymous Cowards suck.
Notice how clean cats keep themselves?
That's just because they know it looks cute, and gets them additional food. It's got nothing to do with hunting - otherwise, why would dogs stink so much?
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Supersaurus sounds like something on Disney, with a teenage American accident.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I think I have seen a documentary where a snake was coiled around its eggs. IIRC, it even had muscle spasms to supply heat. Snakes are cold blodded, right? Or can an animal be warm blooded part of the time?
Awesome with the snake, didn't know that. Slightly different, but don't let us forget that alligators and their cousins sort of sit on their nests... not to keep them warm (the decaying leaves do that) but to protect the eggs from egg stealers.
Dinosaurs are purple. Everyone knows that!
Most people are mostly good most of the time.
It is my belief the true measure of one's colorblindness cannot be adequately measured until such a time as it is up close and personal, such as the instance mentioned in the previous post. I would've expected moderation funny or perhaps interesting, but that particular vote was out of my hands. I abhor ugliness.... does this mean we're not friends anymore?
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Yes.
To both questions. Simultaneously.
An animal can be "warm blooded" (i.e. maintain a relatively high and constant internal temperature) without having a physiological mechanism for maintaining that temperature. Some animals can do it well-enough using behaviour alone.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"