Canadian scientist aims to turn chickens into dinosaurs - Polidicks

At last. [quote] After years spent hunting for the buried remains of prehistoric animals, a Canadian paleontologist now plans to manipulate chicken embryos to show he can create a dinosaur. Hans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds. Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview. Though still in its infancy, the research could eventually lead to hatching live prehistoric animals, but Larsson said there are no plans for that now, for ethical and practical reasons -- a dinosaur hatchery is "too large an enterprise." "It's a demonstration of evolution," said Larsson, who has studied bird evolution for the last 10 years. "If I can demonstrate clearly that the potential for dinosaur anatomical development exists in birds, then it again proves that birds are direct descendants of dinosaurs." The research is funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Canada Research Chairs program and National Geographic. The idea for the project, Larsson said, came about during discussions with renowned American paleontologist Jack Horner, who served as technical advisor for the Jurassic Park films. Horner recently wrote a book entitled "How to Build A Dinosaur," in which he refers to the embryo experiment as part of a quest to create a "chickenosaurus." Larsson's team has previously worked to uncover prehistoric animal remains, including eight unknown species of dinosaurs and five new types of crocodile in Niger. He also recently uncovered the remains of a new carnivorous dinosaur in Argentina. [/quote] [url]http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.60b96f71bf4ba4781f8a5d3a49a22a0e.5f1&show_article=1[/url]

Can the first one be a Cockasaurus Rex?

If he does this, I will fucking be ecstatic. Who [I]doesn't[/I] want to see a fucking dinosaur?! However, I bet he fails, like everyone else.

Maybe now the young earth creationists will shut up.

I watched a show on this and I learned that it is surprisingly theoretically possible. The gene sequence of chickens seem to closely match what are believed to be the same sequences of dinosaurs. The way they know this is because when they make specific changes in the chicken, the physical appearance of the chicken changes to look more like it's dinosaur counterpart.

This would be the coolest shit ever, they should recreate a whole bunch of different dinosaurs and slap them in a giant zoo.

You won't get any Dinosaurs from a Bird. You'll only get a sideshow freak with scales and a toothy beak. It'd be cheaper to just hire some Hollywood makeup artists to put some latex on an Emu.

This sounds identical to what they did in Jurassic Park.

Not really. In Jurassic park they extracted DNA from amber and filled in the damaged code with supercomputers and frog DNA. Somehow this produced a perfectly formed Dinosaur...

Oh shit, it's going to be Jurassic Park again. Except, this time we will lose!

if they can make a chicken a dinosaur... can i be a monkey? :v:

[QUOTE=RR_Raptor65;16940440]Not really. In Jurassic park they extracted DNA from amber and filled in the damaged code with supercomputers and frog DNA. Somehow this produced a perfectly formed Dinosaur...[/QUOTE] I assumed they used Chicken eggs.

What's the point in doing this if they wont even hatch one? Same with human cloning, just fucking do it.

[QUOTE=decilling;16940549]What's the point in doing this if they wont even hatch one? Same with human cloning, just fucking do it.[/QUOTE] It's not ethical and blah blah

[QUOTE=MuTAnT;16940083]This would be the coolest shit ever, they should recreate a whole bunch of different dinosaurs and slap them in a giant zoo.[/QUOTE] da da daaa da da da daaaaaaaaaaa da da daaa de derp da dooooooooo it's jurassic park

[img]http://www.empireonline.com/images/features/ten-movie-eggs/2.jpg[/img] But they should be using frog DNA

[QUOTE=tarkata14;16940036]If he does this, I will fucking be ecstatic. Who [I]doesn't[/I] want to see a fucking dinosaur?! However, I bet he fails, like everyone else.[/QUOTE] It'd take A LOT of genetic tweaking to create a dinosaur from a chicken. At best, with today's technology, you'd end up with a chicken that has claws instead of wings.

I think Jurassic Park has taught us all that this is an incredibly bad idea. There's no part of this that doesn't sound like it'll go horribly wrong. ... but fuck it, dinosaurs are epic. I say go for it.

[QUOTE=Smirnoff Joe;16940634]It'd take A LOT of genetic tweaking to create a dinosaur from a chicken. At best, with today's technology, you'd end up with a chicken that has claws instead of wings.[/QUOTE] Do it in reverse and you get Lizards that can fly Fucking awesome

[QUOTE=lazyguy;16940059]Maybe now the young earth creationists will shut up.[/QUOTE] Sadly, that is too much to hope for.

[QUOTE=DaveP;16940654]Do it in reverse and you get Lizards that can fly Fucking awesome[/QUOTE] dargon?

I saw a documentary about this kind of thing, some scientists managed to create a chicken with teeth, and (I think) one with scales instead of feathers. They didn't let them hatch though, I don't think they were allowed to.

yhere is a loopholw inthe law that states you m8ust be trying to ,ake a dinoseaur from a chicpken or else it's nit legal

[QUOTE=DaveP;16940654]Do it in reverse and you get Lizards that can fly[/QUOTE] It'd need much more than merely giving lizards wings to make 'em fly. They need to have lightweight bones, which means they can't have any bone marrows. Birds overcome this by their red blood cells having nuclei, meaning their red blood cells divide. The wing-size would need to be engineered too, as well as the gait of the lizard. Unless you add a gene that permits a lifeform to have six limbs, like an insect. That way the wings can be on the back, whilst the lizard can walk like normal. Yep, a lot more than merely giving lizards wings is required to give them flight. [QUOTE=Jack Bryce;16940724]I saw a documentary about this kind of thing, some scientists managed to create a chicken with teeth, and (I think) one with scales instead of feathers. They didn't let them hatch though, I don't think they were allowed to.[/QUOTE] Seriously, what law prohibits the creation of a radically-different lifeform?

[QUOTE=Canuhearme?;16940505]I assumed they used Chicken eggs.[/QUOTE] They used unfertilized ostrich eggs in Jurassic Park.

They should do it on an island, just in case, you know. We get fucked up.

[QUOTE=Smirnoff Joe;16941012]Seriously, what law prohibits the creation of a radically-different lifeform?[/QUOTE] No law that I know of. Just religious nuts.

[QUOTE=RR_Raptor65;16940418]You won't get any Dinosaurs from a Bird. You'll only get a sideshow freak with scales and a toothy beak. It'd be cheaper to just hire some Hollywood makeup artists to put some latex on an Emu.[/QUOTE] Dinosaurs are closely related to birds...

I want a pet dinosaur

[QUOTE=bigdan;16941241]They should do it on an island, just in case, you know. We get fucked up.[/QUOTE] If harpoons can kill whales...