Jurassic Park in 3D, and More
Every kid has seen Jurassic Park at one point or another. If you haven't seen it then you need stop reading this blog and go rent it or stream or buy or something, just see it. With that out of the way, even those who might not have seen Jurassic Park should be aware of the basic plot of the movie, or of their original material, books. Simply put, scientists discover dinosaur DNA preserved in ancient misquotes and then use that DNA along with genes spliced from reptiles to recreate dinosaurs in modern times.
While Jurassic Park was first dreamed up over 20 years ago, it easy to watch the movie or read the books and laugh at how silly the science used in those stories seemed. Today for example, we know dinosaurs are most closely related to birds, not lizards or frogs. A simple mistake, but one that would make a huge difference if the idea of Jurassic Park were ever to be realized in real life.Exciting maybe that could be a possibility. Recently, actual organic remains were discovered of Cretaceous period dinosaure embryos, leading to scientists being able to track the growth of dinosaurs through embryonic development for the first time ever.
The bones represent about 20 embryonic individuals of the long-necked sauropodomorph Lufengosaurus, the most common dinosaur in the region during the Early Jurassic period. An adult Lufengosaurus was approximately eight metres long.
With so much actual organic material being discovered and today's continual advances in the fields of genetics, who knows what is possible. Today humans have cloned cows, sheep, dogs, horses, pigs, rabbits, and many other animals. As we get closer and closer to perfecting our cloning techniques is it really that hard to imagine a group of scientists attempting to clone some of this Lufengosaurus material. Another boost to the likely hood of Jurassic park is the genetic mapping being done so feverishly today as well, it seems very possible the missing sections of DNA could be found on some ancient bird and reprogrammed into the dino-DNA, we could do it the same way we make insulin from sheep. The possibilites our modern technology are so great, we may be able to use it to revive ancient life. The question is do we want to? If so, should we??
bryan Cohoon (3)
bryan Cohoon (3)
I remember learning in Evolution how closely related birds are to dinosaurs. Do you think it would be beneficial for us to "revive ancient life"? And if this happened and was successful, would we have a real life Jurassic Park?
ReplyDeletePosted by Cynthia Bui (1)
I don't see any reason for these creatures to be revived other than for entertainment value. It seems very unlikely that they could be introduced into any wild environment without catastrophic effects.
ReplyDeleteHunter Alexander (1)
While I think this is indeed a very interesting idea, I'm still skeptical that cloning of dinosaurs will ever become a reality with our modern biotechnological methods. It really would depend on finding a relatively intact sample of dinosaur DNA, since the process of "filling in the gaps" by splicing other organims' DNA to complete the genome seems like a laborious and far fetched idea. It is difficult to predict the effect that recombinant DNA would have on the phenotype in comparison to the orginal organism, and therefore whether or not your "dinosaurs" (if they are in fact viable) authentically resemble the orginal animals. If I remember, this idea came up in the movies at several points. Anyway, maybe with advances in molecular genetics this could someday become a reality.
ReplyDeletePosted by Sean McDougall (2)
I am completely frightened of dinosaurs-I'm sure there is an actual phobia name out there for that. But it excites me that science has progressed so much that in the future cloning dinosaurs may be a possibility.
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ReplyDeleteThe idea of bringing dinosaurs back into existence would seem to create more problems for our current animal populations and habitats. It would require a lot of planning and work to prevent their existence from leading to such a drastic change and would bring no real benefit. In terms of whether it would be possible seems highly unlikely. Yes it might be possible to clone sheep and other animals but this is only because we already have sheep available to manipulate. To create Dinosaurs from the scraps and pieces of their existence that are still intact would require ingenuity that we have not encountered yet.
ReplyDeleteposted by: Marshall Moini (2)
If the dinosaurs were to be re-created into our modern day society then the same problems that occurred in the Jurassic Park the movie would take place today. You are taking creatures that have been living in an environment that we can barely understand today and thrusting them into a completely new millennium. Then you would just have a bunch of confused, frightened, creatures that probably cannot survive in the current environment anyway. The consequences for the dinosaurs and the human population around them would be catastrophic.
ReplyDeleteposted by Celina Keating (1)
If the dinosaurs were to be re-created into our modern day society then the same problems that occurred in the Jurassic Park the movie would take place today. You are taking creatures that have been living in an environment that we can barely understand today and thrusting them into a completely new millennium. Then you would just have a bunch of confused, frightened, creatures that probably cannot survive in the current environment anyway. The consequences for the dinosaurs and the human population around them would be catastrophic.
ReplyDeleteposted by Celina Keating (1)
it would be interesting to see if they find similar organic material, but of other species. Even if it were possible to re-create life, where would we even out them? We barely have enough room for species of our modern times!
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