WASHINGTON, April 24, 2008
Today's Chickens Are Descended From Dinos
Harvard Scientists Say T-Rex Was A Close Cousin Of Barnyard Fowl
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Harvard Scientists Say This Guy Was Related To Chickens (AP)
Scientists are fleshing out the proof that today's broiler-fryer is descended from the mighty Tyrannosaurus rex.
And, not a surprise, they confirmed a close relationship between mastodons and elephants.
Fossil studies have long suggested modern birds were descended from T. rex, based in similarities in their skeletons.
Now, bits of protein obtained from connective tissues in a T. rex fossil shows a relationship to birds including chickens and ostriches, according to a report in Friday's edition of the journal Science.
"These results match predictions made from skeletal anatomy, providing the first molecular evidence for the evolutionary relationships of a non-avian dinosaur," Chris Organ, a postdoctoral researcher in biology at Harvard University said in a statement.
Co-author John M. Asara of Harvard reported last year that his team had been able to extract collagen from a T. rex and that it most closely resembled the collagen of chickens.
They weren't able to recover dinosaur DNA, the genetic instructions for life, but DNA codes for the proteins they did study.
While the researchers were able to obtain just a few proteins from T. rex, they have now been able to show the relationships with birds.
With more data, Organ said, they would probably be able to place T. rex on the evolutionary tree between alligators and chickens and ostriches.
"We also show that it groups better with birds than modern reptiles, such as alligators and green anole lizards," Asara added.
The dinosaur protein was obtained a fossil found in 2003 by John Horner of the Museum of the Rockies in a barren fossil-rich stretch of land that spans Wyoming and Montana. Mary H. Schweitzer of North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences discovered soft-tissue preservation in the T. rex bone in 2005.
The research of Organ and Asara indicates that the protein from the fossilized tissue is authentic, rather than contamination from a living species.
The researchers also studied material recovered from a mastodon fossil and determined it was related to modern elephants.
Their research was funded by the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, Paul F. Glenn Foundation and the David and Lucille Packard Foundation.
Meanwhile, in another paper in Science, researchers report refining a method to determine ancient dates that will allow them to better pinpoint events such as dinosaurs' extinction.
A team led by Paul Renne, director of the Berkeley Geochronology Center and an adjunct professor of earth and planetary science at the University of California, Berkeley, said they were able to refine the so-called argon-argon dating method to reduce uncertainty. The method compares the ratio or two types of the element argon found in rocks.
The greater precision matters little for recent events in the last few million years, according to Renne, but it can be a major problem for events in the early solar system. For example, a one percent difference at 4.5 billion years is almost 50 million years.
The new system reduces that potential uncertainty to one-fourth of one percent, the researchers said.
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Life is hard for these poor creationists. They have to contend with geology, paleontolology, comparative biology, molecular biology and physics. All these scientists in all these fields have to be hopelessly deluded in order for their 4004 B.C. origin fairy tales to be true. So, who you going to believe? A bunch of guys with Ph.D.s who work at Harvard, or some gap-toothed Bible thumper who didn''t quite get through high school biology?
Posted by lochlan at 09:21 AM : Apr 25, 2008
I think the significance of this finding is that it provides a totally new approach (amino acid sequences) for comparing dinos to chickens. The previous data comparing the two were based on morphology; this paper takes it to the molecular level (I''m sure that''s why it got into Science). It''s not surprising as you said, but it does add to the weight of evidence showing the relationships of birds and dinos.
Try to do that!
The problem with most creationists is they assume that evolution describes the origin of life. It doesn%u2019t that a different field of study referred to as abiogenesis (the study of how life on Earth emerged from non-life). Evolution is a change in the gene pool of a population over time. Basically for evolution to work you have to start with existing living organism not nothing.
Yuk!
I think I''ll have a doughnut now.
And today''s doughnuts are descended from?
Posted by nic1234567 at 10:56 AM : Apr 25, 2008
And singinrick (aka rodbarker?) believed in a theory called "polluted genes". Pretty freakin funny he never addressed my pointing out to him that with all his anti-evolution yakking, he actually believed in it!!
today''''s doughnuts are descended from?
Posted by rushlimpdrug at 11:57 AM : Apr 25, 2008
Doughnuts have a disputed history. One theory suggests that they were introduced into North America by Dutch settlers, However there is also archaeological evidence that the pastries were prepared by prehistoric Native Americans in southwestern USA.
Of course if you%u2019re a creationist then they created on at noon by God of the fifth day just before taking a coffee break
Posted by rushlimpdrug at 11:57 AM : Apr 25, 2008
Doughnuts have a disputed history. One theory suggests that they were introduced into North America by Dutch settlers, However there is also archaeological evidence that the pastries were prepared by prehistoric Native Americans in southwestern USA.
Of course if you%u2019re a creationist then they where created on the fifth day at noon by God just before taking a coffee break.
The problem with most creationists is they assume that evolution describes the origin of life. It doesn%u2019t that a different field of study referred to as abiogenesis (the study of how life on Earth emerged from non-life). Evolution is a change in the gene pool of a population over time. Basically for evolution to work you have to start with existing living organism not nothing.
Posted by nic1234567 at 10:56 AM : Apr 25, 2008
Well said Nic. most creationists suffer from a common misconception contending that darwinian evolution is trying to explain the origin of life. This could not be farther from the truth. Evolution is a theory helping to illuminate the mechanism and reasons for not why life is here, but why it is as diverse as we see. Evolution is a mechanism behind what bio-diversity we see and the proiferation of certain species in secific ecological niches. An evolutionary biologist would NEVER claim to know how life started...they can only offer to shed a little light on where its been.
Posted by honestabe8 at 01:34 PM : Apr 25, 2008
That''s exactly correct my friend. how could they be? They deal with two entirely different issues.
Posted by farmerbb
You got it - I am so sick of these microcephalous religious imbeciles dumbing down our country. "To hell" with them all. Cant believe how stupid most Americans are - truly embarrassing.
Posted by caldwellptr at 03:29 PM : Apr 25, 2008
They didn''t. T-Rex would''ve eaten the chickens, along with everythign else. Then nothing could have evolved.
Your therapy''s just gonna take longer, now that you''re doing the multiple personality thing, s''ick.
Your "polluted gene" refuses to recognize itself as evolution. No wonder you''re such a conflicted, hypocritical, confused mess...
Posted by libagenda at 07:02 PM : Apr 26, 2008
Because evolution has nothing to do with the origin of life why should an evolutionists even care. The term you%u2019re looking for is abiogenesis. Several theories have been proposed, most notably the iron-sulfur world theory (metabolism first), The Bubble Theory and the RNA world hypothesis (genetics first). I really don%u2019t have opinion on this. If you really what to know about abiogenesis and what science has to say about the Origin of life here%u2019s a link that should get you started.
http://www.startsurfing.com/encyclopedia/o/r/i/Origin_of_life.html
Finally not all evolutionists refuse to believe in GOD. There are those of us that believe GOD is driving force behind evolution. However you%u2019re perfectly welcome to you own belief and I respect that. However I should point out that it pointless to come on scientific Blog and try and debate the merits of Evolutionists vs. Creationism.
ThinkHarder: DO WHAT YOUR SCREENNAME SAYS, and THINK HARDER about what you''''re believing in here!
Posted by libagenda at 07:02 PM : Apr 26, 2008
You really don''t understand the theory of evolution do you? At least make an effort to understand what you''re criticizing so vehemently before saying things that can be so easily refuted.
Above you liken the evolution of organisms with the spontaneous creation of a computer or house from bits and pieces. Pretty unlikely to occur by chance, I agree. However, there is something else entirely going on in the evolution of life - natural selection provides a driving force, so it''s not occurring just by chance. Mutations occur by chance, and most of those are deleterious, but every once in a while the ability of an animal to survive in its environment is enhanced, compared to its brethren, and that slight enhancement is passed down and over time the entire gene pool changes. So maybe it''s you who should be thinking harder.
Posted by libagenda at 07:02 PM : Apr 26, 2008
All the nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, etc that are found in all those things you mentioned above are here on Earth because of supernova explosions.
Posted by libagenda at 07:04 PM : Apr 26, 2008
Debunked by a guy with a [ahem] doctorate from a paper mill, unaccredited, university? Convincing.
Posted by libagenda at 06:57 PM : Apr 26, 2008
One last point. Creationists operate by highlighting what they perceive to be weaknesses in the theory of evolution. I want to hear instead exactly what creationist theories explain, and specifically how they explain things better than evolution. So, some sample questions...
1. Why is human DNA more similar to a chimp''s than a dog''s and insect DNA even less similar?
2. What''s with all the fossils buried in the ground? Why did those animals die out?
3. Ambulocetus (for example) looks like a transitional animal between land dwelling animals and whales. How does creationism explain its presence in the fossil record?
4. Why are insect eyes different from mammalian eyes and both are different from those from octopi?
Just a few of many many possible questions.
Can creationists answer ANY of these questions? If they want their ''theories'' considered to be scientific, and taught beside evolution, then they must abide by the rules of science, and one of those rules is that hypotheses and theories have to explain why things are as they are. What does creationism explain? Does it help one design new experiments? Can it predict the results of those experiments?
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by nic1234567-2009
April 27, 2008 1:03 PM PDT
- That''''''''s like saying "Throw the pieces of a computer on the floor, or a pile of sticks on the ground, and see if the computer parts "evolve" into a computer through time, and see if the sticks "evolve" into a house through time.
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Reply to this comment
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See all 33 CommentsPosted by libagenda at 07:02 PM : Apr 26, 2008
There is a fundamental flaw in your example. Computers can not Self-replicate. Self-replication is a fundamental requirement of evolution. Nobody knows what the most primitive cells looked like. All the cells around today are the product of billions of years of evolution. The earliest self-replication was likely very much simpler than anything alive today; self-replicating molecules need not be all that complex.