These bits of frog DNA could have all kinds of negative effects on the developing embryo. In Jurassic Park, the scientists find these missing pieces and fill them with frog DNA, but this wouldn’t give you a dinosaur, it would give you a hybrid or a “frogosaur”. It would be like trying to do the world’s hardest jigsaw puzzle with no idea what the picture looks like or whether there are any missing pieces. Second, even if we could extract dino DNA, it would be chopped up into millions of tiny pieces and we would have little clue as to how these pieces should be organised. The oldest DNA ever found is around one million years old, but for dino DNA we would need to go back at least 66m years, so realistically we’re not even close. Neanderthal and woolly mammoth DNA has been successfully isolated, but dino DNA is just too old.
Prehistoric mosquitoes containing dino blood have been found, but any dino DNA contained within them has long since degraded. This lineage includes the emergence of dinosaurs and pterosaurs ~240 million years ago, passing through the theropod dinosaurs (whose members include T.rex and Velociraptor) and ends with birds.ĭespite us not making any claims to have extracted dino DNA, the question that seems to be on most people’s lips is “does this bring us closer to a real Jurassic Park?” The answer is an emphatic “no”, and here’s why.įirst, the idea that there is intact dino DNA contained within blood-sucking insects preserved in amber just doesn’t add up. We began by working out the most likely genomic structure of the bird-turtle ancestor, before tracing any changes that occurred from then to the present day. Although individual animals from the same species will have a different DNA sequence, the overall genomic structure is species-specific. The genomic structure is the way that genes are arranged on chromosomes in each species. Quite by chance, we’ve recently identified the overall genomic structureof dinosaurs. Jurassic Park’s solution for resurrecting dinosaurs. The “Mr DNA” sequence in the original movie is a great piece of science communication and the concept of extracting DNA from the bodies of “dino” blood-engorged mosquitoes is an outstanding piece of fiction. But the films have had an additional benefit-they have sparked an interest in dinosaur DNA.
There is something awe inspiring about the biggest, fiercest, and “deadest” creatures that have ever walked the planet.
This summer, the fifth installment of the Jurassic Park franchise will be on the big screen, reinforcing a love of dinosaurs that has been with many of us since childhood. The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.
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