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Tuesday, April 17, 2007

 

Researchers Decode T Rex Genetic Material

‘Researchers have decoded genetic material from a 68 million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex, an unprecedented step once thought impossible.

“The door just opens up to a whole avenue of research that involves anything extinct,” said Matthew T. Carrano, curator of dinosaurs at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.

And, the new finding adds weight to the idea that today’s birds are descendants of dinosaurs. [..]

“The fact that we are getting proteins is very, very exciting,” said John Horner of Montana State University and the Museum of the Rockies.

And, he added, it “changes the idea that birds and dinosaurs are related from a hypothesis to a theory.”

To scientists that’s a big deal.’




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