Protein fragments sequenced in 68 million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex

harminka — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 13:27:04 -0500

In a venture once thought to lie outside the reach of science, researchers from Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center have captured and sequenced tiny pieces of collagen protein from a 68 million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex. The protein fragments-seven in all-appear to most closely match amino acid sequences found in collagen of present day chickens, lending support to a recent and still controversial proposal that birds and dinosaurs are evolutionarily related.