Radiometric dating!" Ever since Mary Schweitzer found soft, stretchy tissue in a T. rex fossil in 2004, scientists have been trying to come to grips with how some biological tissues and cells could preserve within ancient critters. Are the data driving the paradigm, or vice versa? In short, he argues that because we know that fossil fuels, coalified wood and invertebrate fossils are tens or hundreds of millions of years old, whats the problem with accepting dinosaur soft tissue being that old as well? Before the law suit on this dismissal went to court, CSUN settled, paying compensatory damages, lawyers fees, and money for lost wages. The short half-life is only part of the problem when dating dinosaur bones -- researchers also have to find enough of the parent and daughter atoms to measure. When paleontologist Mary Schweitzer found soft tissue in a Tyrannosaurus rex fossil, her discovery raised an obvious question -- how the tissue could have survived so long? WebWhereas most soft tissue has to undergo a decalcification process to recover its original state, this material did not appear to have been subject to any calcification. Blood vessels, red blood cells, and soft and stretchy ligaments were found in the bone. They admit it exists, but can only make up stories Where they should be three separate bones, these bones have grown together, Carrano said. Margaret Osborne As the award recipient Schweitzer was the keynote speaker and presented on her research. Does he face the objections to the crosslinking hypothesis presented by Dr Kevin Anderson in the link above? Give me time in the future and all your doubts will fall. And they need to be tested quickly, as soft tissue could degrade once exposed to modern air and humidity. These are chemical elements, like carbon or uranium, that are identical except for one key feature -- the number of neutrons in their nucleus. "Geologic Time." To determine the ages of these specimens, scientists need an isotope with a very long half-life. Advertising Notice . However we have no reason to believe that they were not literal years, genesis is very specific, even to odd numbers. But carbon-14 dating won't work on dinosaur bones. It was filed under Christian, Creation, Spiritual and was tagged with Armitage, biblical time, blood cells, Blood vessels, dinosaur, discimination, geologic time, proteins, Schweitzer, soft tissue. Which needs less demystifying? Do proposed solutions beg the question or toss answers into the futureware bin? The new skull of D. matildae is nearly indistinguishable from that of the Argentinian dinosaur, Sarmientosaurus musacchioi. Her work has appeared in theSag Harbor Expressand has aired onWSHU Public Radio. When did the Hebrews or Israelites become known as Jews? WebT-Rex in soft Tissue!Tyrannosaurs Rex, the most popular Dinosaur in the world touted to have lived over 70 million years ago has been found in soft tissue. That study, mentioned by Kevin Anderson in the video clip, reported stretchable tissue and osteocytes present in a Triceratops horn. WebThe Soft Tissue in Dinosaur Bone. All rights reserved. To read the time on this radioactive clock, scientists use a device called a mass spectrometer to measure the number of parent and daughter atoms. Original article on LiveScience. But I wanted to show the chemistry behind these ideas, and that it plausibly explains the soft tissues and cells were seeing in, for example, dinosaurs. But as compelling as this evidence for a young earth might seem, the preservation of dinosaur soft tissue for 68 million years can be readily explained. 2009: protein (collagen) fragments were isolated from a 80 million year old (geologic time scale) hadrosaur fossil. And in 2015 fibers and cellular structures were discovered preserved in 75 million year old dinosaur specimens. You are also agreeing to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. The same is true if you take a block away from one of the pyramid's sides, making the rest unstable. Sometimes a dinosaur carcass has been preserved as a natural mummy with widespread skin impressions. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. The result is like a radioactive clock that ticks away as unstable isotopes decay into stable ones. But this sediment doesn't typically include the necessary isotopes in measurable amounts. The fossil horn was found in the famous Hell Creek Formation near Glendive, Montana. Yes, proteins do break down into amino acids or peptides that crosslink to form N-heterocyclic polymers. According to new research, iron in the dinosaur's body preserved the tissue before it could decay. The element's half-life is the amount of time it takes for half the parent atoms in a sample to become daughters. Two weeks after the results of this research were published, Armitage was terminated from his position as the Manager of the Electron and Confocal Microscopy Laboratory in the Biology Department at California State University Northridge (CSUN). This fall I will be presenting at the 2016 National Conference on Christian Apologetics. The more vulnerable areas of the fibers should break down first, with the most protected ones persisting over timea type of molecular survival of the fittest. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Radiometric dating relies on the properties of isotopes. [13] The extraction of protein, soft tissue, remnant cells and organelle-like structures from dinosaur fossils has been confirmed. During the excavation of Ann, which took place in 2018, the skulls pieces were found scattered over a roughly 100-square-foot area with the animals back leg bones. The soft tissues found by Schweitzer and others are not mineral replacements of soft tissue; they are the original soft tissue. Despite very good reasons to believe that collagen could survive for tens of millions of years in the matrix of dinosaur bones, some in the scientific community have questioned the soft-tissue finds.2 They claim these materials resulted from bacterial contamination of the fossils with microbially derived structures, thus creating a false appearance of blood vessels and cells. Red blood cells could be clearly viewed using a thrift store microscope! In a new study published today (Nov. 26) in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Schweitzer thinks she has the answer: Iron. Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. However we have no reason to believe that they were not literal years, genesis is very specific, even to odd numbers. So they involve huge extrapolations in time. Soft tissue impressions are usually of the skin. 15009 Lancaster Highway | Charlotte, NC 28277704-847-5600 |[emailprotected] 2022 | All Rights Reserved, Affiliation, Authorization, & Accreditation, 3 Reasons You Should Consider a Seminary Education, 8 Essential Facts for Effective Christian Apologetics, 24 Questions about Christianity & Social Justice. WebEvidence for the extraction of short segments of ancient DNA from dinosaur fossils has been reported on two occasions. But for some people, the discovery raised a different question. Within the bone matrix, collagen fibers adsorb to the mineral component of bone. Typically an animals remains mineralizeas they decay, so most specimens of this supposed age consist of inorganic material. The most recent explanation is oxidative cross-linking of chemically reactive proteins with glucose or lipid molecules to form polymers, which are highly resistant to decay, water and bacteria. "How Do Scientists Determine the Age of Dinosaur Bones?" London bridge has fallen down Unfortunately, these elements don't exist in dinosaur fossils themselves. For example, see these RTB resources for probable explanations for the T. rex soft tissue. Does he deal adequately with all the objections, like temperature fluctuations, percolating water, radiation and all? Bio-film (a product of more recent bacterial action), cant explain the presence of proteins or DNA. The American Biology Teacher (2021) 83 (5): 298302. Young-Earth Creationists Arent the Only Skeptics. Notice that the press release admits that these biological tissues and cells exist. Both of these reptiles were titanosaurs, or massive sauropods that lived around 66 million to 145 million years ago. Change), You are commenting using your Facebook account. In fact, collagen makes up around 25 to 30 percent of all proteins found in animals. The resemblances between the skulls of Diamantinasaurus and the similarly aged Sarmientosaurus from southern South America are pretty striking.. Then a blatant assertion is made to sweep away the issue: Because we didnt realize that these processes could come from the same starting place and share a step, the hypotheses have been presented as separate, Anderson says. Armitages claim that he had been unlawfully terminated was vindicated as the university was unwilling to go to court. The last step may be the trickiest: Possibly the most controversial part of reconstructing a dinosaur's appearance is determining what, It also explains why collagen fragments survived for 68 million years and is consistent with my earlier suggestions. The soft tissues are collagen, a connective protein. Along with [11] published in PLoS ONE (30 July 2008) challenged the claims that the material found is the soft tissue of Tyrannosaurus. The bone was 68 million years old, and conventional wisdom about fossilization is that all soft tissue, from blood to brains, decomposes. This is a question-begging argument, like saying Whats the problem with saying Corvettes evolved by chance, refuting intelligent design? [18], On April 28, 2018, Schweitzer became the first recipient of the Dr. Elizabeth 'Betsy' Nicholls Award for Excellence in Palaeontology at the Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre's Dig Deep Gala event. At that time, Australia, Antarctica, New Zealand and South America were all connected in a southern landmass known as Gondwana. This forced closeness allows for broken strands to occasionally rejoin and reform the original protein. Evidence for the extraction of short segments of ancient DNA from dinosaur fossils has been reported on two occasions. Because the creature had a rounded snout, paleontologists conclude it browsed for foliage at varying heights rather than always feeding low to the ground, per the Guardian. While fossils generally do not preserve soft tissue such as lungs, a very fine theropod dinosaur fossil ( Sinosauropteryx) has been found in which the outline of the visceral cavity has been well preserved. The obvious question, though, was how soft, pliable tissue could survive for millions of years. These two hypotheses, taken together, dont answer every question regarding soft tissue preservation in deep time. Chronological index. Collagen fibers comprise one of the chief components of connective tissue, are embedded in the bone matrix, and help form blood vessels. Then, in 2007, Schweitzer and her colleagues analyzed the chemistry of the T. rex proteins. This work shows that at least two of the more popular hypotheses actually share a chemical pathway and overlap quite a bit. In response to these claims, researchers mapped collagen fragments isolated from theT. But after several years of debate, its generally agreed that the soft tissue discovered by Mary Schweitzer is authentic. Collagens basic structural unit is called a triple helix, consisting of three protein chains intertwining around each other. This review posits a chemical framework describing the persistence of biological soft tissues into deep time. If the broken strands were not held juxtaposed to each other, the fragments would diffuse away from each other, thus, preventing the reversal of the degradation process. The mapping study supports the bioauthenticity of the collagen fragments. Microscopy images of "soft tissues" isolated from bones of the Cretaceous dinosaur Brachylophosaurus canadensis (MOR 2598 and GPDM 328), along with extant Struthio camelus analogs. The prior iron-mediated radical crosslinking and AGE/ALE mechanisms are re-described in context of established chemistry from a diversity of scientific fields. And he coauthored a peer-review paper in a scholarly journal about the find. Some researchers say that the detailed, external bone surface texture on the face of, say, the T. rex is just like that of a crocodilian. Wake up to the day's most important news. Under the biblical explanation of geologic history (see Appendix B), the dinosaurs were buried during the global flood about 4.5k years ago. One of the most provocative pieces of evidence young-earth creationists cite for a 6,000- to 10,000-year-old Earth is the discovery of soft-tissue remains in a dinosaur specimen that dates around 68 million years old. The big question is, why are the soft tissues still there in dinosaur bones when artificial decay experiments show soft tissues can last thousands of years but not millions of years? This process measures isotope decay inside the fossil or the rock to determine its exact age. Ive been trying ever since to disprove it. Significantly, Landon Anderson does cite the published work by Mark Armitage and Kevin Anderson in Acta Histochemica (2013) in his list of soft tissue reports. Schweitzer earned a B.S. Trace Fossils 5. Armitage believes that if dinosaurs have soft tissue in their bones, then something is wrong with the belief system that says the world is billions of years old. This is a world famous area for finding fossil dinosaur remains. The contact with the surface protects the protein and keeps the pieces of collagen juxtaposed whenever the protein strands break. This information has also helped determine the age of the Earth itself. And so all of you skeptics eat crow; away with you! Fossils represent the order of burial during the flood. They then tested the iron-as-preservative idea using modern ostrich blood vessels. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 01, 2009. And it doesnt explain wholly soft, pliable tissue. (LogOut/ Meanwhile, Schweitzer has been testing whether the medullary bone and other soft tissue she discovered are original. [9][10] But there are a number of different chemical pathways that can result in crosslinking. I still havent (Service, 2017). While soft tissue is rare because it decomposes, scientists have found intact soft tissue in dinosaur bones before. AiGUSAs Dr. David Menton Even a polymer shield strong enough to resist microbes would develop cracks. What did David mean when he wrote that he was fearfully made in Psalm 139:14? [5], In 2000, Bob Harmon, chief preparator of paleontology at the Museum of the Rockies, discovered a Tyrannosaurus skeleton in the Hell Creek Formation in Montana. 5. If you try to add extra blocks to the sides pyramid, they may stay put for a while, but they'll eventually fall away. In recent years, researchers have found 1) epithelial cell and osteoclast remnants; 2) the remains of blood vessels, and 3) heme, and hemoglobin components in the partially fossilized Tyrannosaurus rex femur. In addition, the oldest known moon rocks are 4.5 billion years old. New Scientist. At least six possible explanations (including bacterial contaminants) have been suggested for this preservation of soft tissue in dinosaur bones, but they have all been refuted (Thomas, 2019). They seem so fresh that it appears as You can watch the tissue stretch in the video. At the end of the Cretaceous Period, dinosaurs went extinct. They're also buried in sandstone, which is porous and may wick away bacteria and reactive enzymes that would otherwise degrade the bone. In relative dating, fossils are compared to similar fossils and rocks, the ages of which are known. The discovery of soft tissue in dinosaur bones by Mary Schweitzer was unexpected and scientists have struggled to find a robust explanation. Margaret Osborne is a freelance journalist based in the southwestern U.S. Draw the Dinosaur's Face. These layers are like bookends -- they give a beginning and an end to the period of time when the sedimentary rock formed. Some researchers say that the detailed, external bone surface texture on the face of, say, the T. rex is just like that of a crocodilian. Thomas T, 2019, Does the Toast Model explain fossil protein persistence?, Institute for Creation Research. The iron-removing techniques should allow paleontologists to search more effectively for soft tissue, and to test it when they find it. Nicknamed Ann, the long-necked specimen is just the fourth of the species Diamantinasaurus matildae ever uncovered. Schweitzer has also isolated organic compounds and antigenic structures in sauropod egg shells. The bones of these various specimens are articulated, not scattered, suggesting they were buried quickly. Also proteins like collagen, hemoglobin, osteocalcin, actin, and tubulin were found. Uniformitarian scientists get upset by statements like these because they assume that the earth is billions of years old and that life began simple and became more complex over time. ), Fixatives like formaldehyde keep the tissues from degrading in part, they make them less digestible to bacteria, says Landon Anderson, doctoral candidate at NCState and lead author of a study in Earth Science Reviews. The blood vessels left in water turned into a disgusting mess within days. The discovery is the latest in several recent - and controversial - soft tissue finds by archaeologists: researchers last November claimed the controversial discovery of WebCollagen and soft tissue were detected in dinosaur bones which is " exceptional preservation " and should not be there after so long a time period as 65 M years. In recent decades, soft, squishy tissues have been discovered inside fossilized dinosaur bones. It weighed 8 kg (18 pounds). A chemical framework for the preservation of fossil vertebrate cells and soft tissues (Landon A. Anderson, Earth Science Reviews, May 2023 issue). Armitages attorney said that the state would never have paid such a huge sum unless it was very concerned about losing in court. Since then Schweitzer said, Thats the way science should work. Another alternative is that its not really soft tissue, but even hard-core evolutionists agree thats what it is. As the soft tissue in dinosaur bones can be explained readily under the biblical time scale, this supplies a more realistic explanation of the presence of soft tissue in dinosaur bones than the uniformitarian (geologic) time scale. One of the most provocative pieces of evidence young-earth creationists cite for a 6,000- to 10,000-year-old Earth is the discovery of soft-tissue remains in a dinosaur specimen that dates around 68 million years old. Did you know that in 2013 a scientist was fired by a University because of his research into soft tissue in dinosaur bones? (1/2/2008) http://wrgis.wr.usgs.gov/docs/parks/gtime/radiom.html, USGS. The soft material was present in pre- and post-decalcified bone. Her first report of the preserved tissue ( Science, 25 March 2005, p. 1952) was based on preliminary tests. Iron chelators increased fossil tissue immunoreactivity to multiple antibodies dramatically, suggesting a role for iron in both preserving and masking proteins in fossil tissues. The extraction of protein, soft tissue, remnant cells and organelle-like structures from dinosaur fossils has been confirmed. After a two-year retrieval process, Jack Horner, director of the Museum, gave the femur bone to Schweitzer. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0GrQiUuq4s]. Subjects: Scientific Evidence for a Young Earth? Today's knowledge of fossil ages comes primarily from radiometric dating, also known as radioactive dating. Such implications that are immediately apparent from examining the chemical framework are discussed. Such a thing could hardly happen today, for soft tissue decays rather quickly under any condition. This means that soft tissue in dinosaur bones provides another reason (besides, living fossils, coastal geomorphology, fossilization of large animals and orally-transmitted Aboriginal stories) to be skeptical of the uniformitarian (geologic) time scale. So to determine the age of sedimentary rock layers, researchers first have to find neighboring layers of Earth that include igneous rock, such as volcanic ash. How Are Dino Tissues Preserved in Deep Time? But does formaldehyde preserve tissues for tens of millions of years? Yes. Schweitzer was the first researcher to identify and isolate soft tissues (such as collagen, a connective protein) from an ancient fossil bone (Appendix A). At certain points along the triple helix, the individual protein strands are chemically bound to each other to form crosslinks. A thigh bone from a 70-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex has given fossil experts an unexpected treasure: well-preserved soft tissue. Wollemi pine: A living fossil Draw the Dinosaur's Face. Blood-derived porphyrin proteins have also been discovered in a mid Eocene mosquito fossil. However, Mary Schweitzer, a molecular paleontologist at North Carolina State University, who headed up the research on the T. rex remains, explained that the soft tissue was able to be preserved by iron in the dinosaurs body, which preserved the tissue before it could decay. As Ive previously pointed out, it is not all that surprising that collagen (or at least fragments of it) could survive 68 million years in an environment devoid of water, oxygen, and microbes given its structure. The biblical explanation allows for catastrophic events (such as the flood of Noah), whereas the Uniformitarian explanation minimizes the role of catastrophic events (because it has a preference for gradual events).

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