Scientists recover T. rex soft tissue

[Kythereia]

Please tell me somebody’s thinking of Jurassic Park here…

(Upon preview, it appears Trisk already has. bows humbly out of thread)

[SteveG1]

Jurassic Park? I was thinking Colonel Sanders. How much batter would you need for one of those drumsticks? It would be cool to be able to answer so many questions - were dinos warm or cold blooded, how closely related were they to modern birds, did they have feathers or scales, the questions keep coming.

[Revtim]

I would love to try a dino-steak or dino-burger.

[Ponder_Stibbons]

At last, mankind’s dream of recreating the opening scene of the Flintstones is within our grasp!

[detop]

@zoid

Am I the only one who thought “Oh great, Jurrasic Park is one step closer”

I call dibs on the first pet Compsognathus

[CynicalGabe]

@detop

I call dibs on the first pet Compsognathus

Just don’t fall down a hillside with them around.

[detop]

@CynicalGabe

Just don’t fall down a hillside with them around.

I just want one, not a pack of them Do you think I’m that stoopid ?

[Harborwolf]

Dibs on a protoceratops.

[Captain_Lance_Murdoch]

Dinosaur soft tissues have been discovered before. I suspect this case is getting more attention than previous discoveries because T-Rex is involved. I don’t get how this is supposed to radically change our understanding of the process of mineralization. I’ve always heard it described as something that is very rare for soft tissues but not impossible.

Oh, and YECs have indeed tried to use this as “evidence” of their “theories” in the past.

[ExTank]

@slortar

Oh, great. That’s what we need around here. Mosquitos with t-rex DNA.

I smell the plot of a Sci-Fi Channel Original Movie here.

[Tuckerfan]

@Triskadecamus

It will be very expensive. We’re talking about finding, and shipping very expensive fossil pieces you have to “borrow” from institutions, and using forensic science that can be very profitably applied to modern commercial work, and employing science resources from half a dozen different disciplines. A big project, rather than a test you order from “the lab.” And permission from the institutions that own all the various elements you need to include.

I’m confident that funding will be forthcomming, but it is a tight economy, just now, if you can’t produce weapons. (Hmmmmm, rethink that Jurassic Park, thing, ya think?)

Tris

I really think that weaponization of T. Rex’s is the way to go. Who needs high tech gizmos when you can just drop a bunch of T. Rexes into the target country and let them run amok? As an added benefit, buildings will be relavtively intact, and other than giant piles of dino doo, there won’t be any hazardous materials worries.

[Ogre]

Water is supposed to be able to percolate THROUGH sandstone though, right?

Maybe not. I don’t know the characteristics of the sandstone in question, but in my part of the country (Cumberland Plateau Alabama,) even a very thin layer of sandstone forms a very effective aquaclude. In fact, there’s a layer of sandstone that rarely gets more than 10 or so feet thick that runs right between two layers of massive limestone deposits here (at least a thousand feet thick apiece, for reference,) and as a result, almost every major waterfall spring around here occurs at 1,100 feet above sea level. The Hartselle sandstone catches all the water percolating through the limestone, and it runs off the surface of it.

[Ponder_Stibbons]

@Tuckerfan

I really think that weaponization of T. Rex’s is the way to go.

[Doctor Evil]
I ask for Tyrannasaurus Rexes with frickin’ laser beams and what do it get? Scipionyx samniticuses. I mean, really.
[/Doctor Evil]

[Number Two]
Well, they are ill tempered scipionyx samniticuses …
[/Number Two]

[Cuckoorex]

@Captain Lance Murdoch

Dinosaur soft tissues have been discovered before. I suspect this case is getting more attention than previous discoveries because T-Rex is involved.

Well, according to the cnn.com article:

Schweitzer said that after removing the minerals from the specimen, the remaining tissues were soft and transparent and could be manipulated with instruments.

The bone matrix was stretchy and flexible and there were long structures like blood vessels. She added that what appeared to be individual cells were visible, but could not say if they were blood cells.

That aspect (the remaining tissue being stretchy and flexible) is, as far as I know, unheard of in dinosaur fossils. You have petrified fossils of soft tissue, but not soft tissue that is honest-to-god soft.

[Earthworm_Jim]

@ExTank

I smell the plot of a Sci-Fi Channel Original Movie here.

No, that’s an overdone dino-steak you smell. We’ll put a fresh one on the grill for you.

[Polycarp]

@Lissa

Young Earth Creationists are going to have a field day. We’ll never hear the end of it.

Lissa gets the Cassandra Award for Prophecy of the Unwanted for this:

Creationists Welcome Fossil Find

When an N.C. State University paleontologist reported finding tissue in dinosaur bones last month, her message was clear: More than fossils may survive for 68 million years.
But some Christian creationists are reinterpreting Mary Schweitzer’s startling discovery to advance their cause. They embrace the Biblical story of Earth’s creation and reject evidence that life evolved here over billions of years.

These “young Earth” creationists say that the planet is closer to 6,000 years old and that Schweitzer’s find bolsters their view. They say the not-yet-fossilized tissue and possible blood remnants Schweitzer found in a Tyrannosaurus rex bone could never have survived for millions of years…

(snip)

One young-Earth group, Answers in Genesis, celebrates Schweitzer’s Tyrannosaurus rex find with two articles on its Web site, several photos from her paper in the journal Science, and a promo that reads: “Breaking Dino News … but will the evidence convince them?”

Speakers with the Institute for Creation in California will emphasize Schweitzer’s findings in future talks they deliver to college campuses, community groups and churches.

“We think this is really very powerful evidence,” said co-founder Duane Gish, a biochemist and 30-year creationism activist.

[Shirley_Ujest]

@Lord Ashtar

Maybe if you get bit by one of those mosquitos you develop the power to mutate into a t-rex at will.

These arms…they dooo nothing! I can’t even wipe my ass!

[Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor]

@Shirley Ujest

These arms…they dooo nothing! I can’t even wipe my ass!

Do the Goggles help?

[GargoyleWB]

I’m reminded of the hilarious scene from the otherwise dreadful movie Caveman (with Ringo Starr) where the T-Rex is teetering on the edge of the cliff, pinwheeling its little forearms for balance. I’m giggling just thinking about it

[clayton_e]

Why are they speculating about whether or not they’ve found blood cells? I thought blood cells have no nucleus and therefore are relatively useless.