Is it bollocks?

Film Buff investigates the facts behind outlandish movie plots.

Demystifying dino DNA.

THIS MONTH JURASSIC PARK’S DINO DNA TINKERING

Q Extinct critters are brought back to life via DNA from a mosquito trapped in amber. Remotely possible?

A dean Lomax, PaLaeontoLogist at the University of Manchester @Dean_r_LoMax www.DeanrLoMax.co.Uk

Mosquitos in amber are pretty rare, though other blood-sucking animals such as ticks have been found. But the amber mine in Jurassic Park is set in the Dominican where that amber is between 20–40 million years old – long after dinosaurs like the T-rex, brachiosaurus and velociraptor were alive. Would it be possible to extract DNA? Simply, no.

Although fossilised ‘blood’ has been found in several specimens, it is still subject to the same process of fossilisation where the original structures are completely replaced by minerals – thus, DNA does not survive. The only place where this might be possible is with Ice Age animals (such as mammoths), but even then the DNA has still degraded. However, dinosaurs are still alive in the form of birds. So this concept of ‘dinosaurs are extinct’ should, well, become extinct itself!

There have been plans to use mammoth DNA to impregnate a living elephant and ‘bring the mammoth back’ – as a hybrid. Not only is this morally wrong, it costs huge sums of money – money that would be far better spent protecting endangered animals than playing science fiction.

VERDICT BOLLOCKS

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