Dinosaur Files
Creating a dinosaur?
In biology class today we were going over genes and DNA, and the topic of creating a dinosaur was brought up. At one point, the teacher confirmed the fact that....and this is important....a chicken in the EMBRYONIC stage was created with jaws and a tail, using embryonic stem cells. Does anybody know more about this? I know that actual dinosaur DNA has not yet been obtained, but could it be possible to create a similar animal? Are there any pictures? hehe I am well aware of the genetically altered chicken.....as well as the Discovery Channel show. However, I do think it will be possible within a few decades...technology and genetics are both advancing at an extremely fast pace.
Public Comments
- No stem cells were used, all they did was change the expression of a few genes. Changing body plan is actually rather easy as it is controlled by a handful of master genes. Theoretically yes, but we know no idea how to do it. Yes, not very impressive though: http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.sciam.com/media/inline/000E9965-99A6-13FB-99A683414B7F0000_1.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm%3Fid%3Dmutant-chicken-grows-alli&h=175&w=200&sz=19&hl=en&start=10&um=1&tbnid=SGjBHU0Y1PMRnM:&tbnh=91&tbnw=104&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dchicken%2Bwith%2Bteeth%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN
- Impractical for the foreseeable future. DNA degrades over time, so a Jurassic Park scenario is basically impossible; the dinosaurs have been gone too long so any DNA that might be found would be ruined.
- She probably saw it on the discovery channel because im watching some re-runs today. They said that a baby chick has the ability to be a dinosaur(flying type of course) by genetically altering its DNA so that it can grow a couple more vertebrae(tail) and to start growing teeth. They did it on tv and it shows how it does grow a tail and teeth, but they never say if they succeeded. At the end, they take an egg of an emu looking thing and do everything they did like making it grow teeth and tail but the show ends and they dont say whether they actually did it.
