Rare dinosaur fossil bed reveals growth inside eggs

Not sure if this was posted but this is a interesting fact and find by the researchers and I wonder that how many more species/fossils remains to be uncovered from the earth's past. I still wonder if anyone has successfully attempted to re-produce the species in the labs around the world since the last time the subject/idea was being discussed after the movie 'Jurassic Park' hit the screens. BTW the movie has been re-released in 3D.

A Canadian-led group of paleontologists is getting a detailed look at how baby dinosaurs developed inside their eggs, by examining an ancient fossil bed full of embryos.

During the Late Jurassic, about 190 million years ago, huge, long-necked plant-eating dinosaurs called Lufengosaurus gathered together at the site in China's Yunnan province to lay clutches of softball-sized eggs, year after year.

An excavation of the site led by Robert Reisz at the University of Toronto Mississauga has yielded crushed eggshells —the oldest dinosaur eggshells ever found — and 200 tiny bones from at least 20 Lufengosaurus embryos, including some that amazingly still appeared to have some protein attached to them, the researchers reported in the journal Nature this week.
The flooding likely occurred at slightly different times each year over a number of years.

"The eggs were caught at different stages of development," Reisz said in an interview. "That's what makes this project really exciting."

SOURCE

It depends if you believe in coincidences but this news just appeared around the same time Jurassic Park 3D is being released in cinemas.

Reisz said the bones were so much older than any that had ever yielded any protein before that he was skeptical the Taiwanese researchers would find anything. "Basically, normally, I would not have thought even to try it," he recalled.

It is better to try and fail than fail to try. Take that skeptical science!

reply to post by hp1229

including some that amazingly still appeared to have some protein attached to them

Hmmm... isn't that enough to extract DNA from the bones? Getting the DNA is the first step to cloning them.

if they cloned a dinosaur wouldn't it be far from Jurassic park since the atmosphere is different now than millions of years ago? mini dinosaur pets maybe? reminds me of that thread with the mini colorado t rex

Originally posted by oniraug
if they cloned a dinosaur wouldn't it be far from Jurassic park since the atmosphere is different now than millions of years ago?

That's a very good point actually. I think the atmosphere was much more oxygen-rich back then. I actually wouldn't be surprised if they were incapable of living within our current atmosphere. We'd probably need to build a special containment zone for them with an artificial atmosphere.

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder

Originally posted by oniraug
if they cloned a dinosaur wouldn't it be far from Jurassic park since the atmosphere is different now than millions of years ago?

That's a very good point actually. I think the atmosphere was much more oxygen-rich back then. I actually wouldn't be surprised if they were incapable of living within our current atmosphere. We'd probably need to build a special containment zone for them with an artificial atmosphere.

On topic, and you reminded me. We have a very large balloon type of toy that was in an old closet. It was blown up in 1975 (air from 1975 is in the balloon toy). I released the "cork" from it a few years ago, just to take in some of the air, and it was soooooo sweet tasting. An amazing taste, clean and pure. I closed it quickly so no more was released, and it's been like having an old and tasty wine still in the bottle.

So can cloned dinos live in our air? Never thought of it, so it's a very good question. Does anyone know?

reply to post by hp1229


I must admit, it would be awesome to see some of the extince
creatures....I would only hope that if they were ever able to
clone any of them, they get it right....

otherwise, just imagine.....

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder

Originally posted by oniraug
if they cloned a dinosaur wouldn't it be far from Jurassic park since the atmosphere is different now than millions of years ago?

That's a very good point actually. I think the atmosphere was much more oxygen-rich back then. I actually wouldn't be surprised if they were incapable of living within our current atmosphere. We'd probably need to build a special containment zone for them with an artificial atmosphere.

This is also why insects were much larger than they are now as well.

[color=sky blue] That is some amazing information. A star for the post. If nothing else, they could probably publish a paper about embryonic stages of plant eating dinosaurs. Although, that protein could have some DNA that might be analyzed. I am not sure about cloning potential. Jurassic Park gave me T-Rex and Velociraptor nightmares for a while. I hope if anyone tried to clone one, that the result would be a mini. Gives me the shivers just thinking about it.