A Fascinating Look at Modern Paleontology

books:

	• How to Build a Dinosaur: Extinction Doesn't Have to Be Forever Jack Horner, James Gorman Dutton Adult, 2009 - 246 pages average customer review:based on 13 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A Fascinating Look at Modern Paleontology

This is a fascinating look at some groundbreaking work on a Tyrannosuarus fossil that may contain preserved soft tissue as well as fossilized bones.

The book recounts the story of Mary Schweitzer finding what might be cartilage, blood vessles and red blood cells in a T. Rex skeleton found by Dr. Horner (one of the book's authors). Additionally, Mary Schweitzer believes that she can tell us that this particular T. Rex was female and pregnant at the time of its death. This claim is based on Ms. Schweitzer having found what might be medullary bone, which is found only in pregnant birds.

This work also discusses the possibility of reverse engineering a dinosaur. By this I mean taking the DNA of a bird and manipulating its DNA in such a way as to "bring back" traits that were present in Dinosaurs, but which modern birds no longer have. Scientests have apparantly done enough work in this area to create birds with teeth! This is coming at the possibility of "cloning" a dinosaur from the opposite direction of the one Michael Crichton took in Jurasic Park.

This book does a good job of explaining the various, highly complicated tests used on the fossil in ways that a laymen can readily understand. The book's one weakness is that it meanders into topics that add interesting color to the story, but which are not directly related to the topic at hand.

Over all, this is a delightful read and recommended to anyone interested in Dinosaurs.

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possibilities for the future

this book represents an intriguing look into the future of genetic manipulation. Indeed, the creation of a dinochiken may only be the first in a series of genetic recreations of past species. the genetic code hides many ancient genes that,if turned on, can shed light on the long process of evolution, perhaps all the way into deep time. This is the real "Jurassic Park", as the author describes it. This book is clear in its presentation, and is written for the layman, although a sound education in the fundamentals of Biology will surely help.Jack Horner is a masterful storyteller. I read the entire book in a few days, as I couldn't put in down once I started reading. ----Enjoy!

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An Eye Into the Past

Renowned paleontologist, Jack Horner, and James Gorman, deputy science editor of The New York Times, have written a profound book in How to Build A Dinosaur. Rather than zeroing in on ancient dinosaur DNA, Horner and his colleagues instead focus on evolutionary development, or "evo-devo", as they term it.

We know that the embryos of multiple creatures develop in a similar fashion, for a time featuring arm and beg buds as well as tails. Assuming that dinosaurs evolved in a similar manner, Jack Horner contends that it might be possible to reverse evolution from the embryo of a modern chicken. Such a massive step is controversial to be sure, but the benefits of manipulating genes at just the right point in development might very well assist us in resolving spinal chord problems and other birth defects in humans today.

Jack Horner cites to some of the great fossil discoveries of the past, as well as current research involving exploration of past life forms on a molecular level. This book is an excellent bridge between paleontology and cutting edge technology. How to Build A Dinosaur is the marriage of two types of investigations in our continual search for the answers to the questions of evolution, selection and the tantalizing prospect of some day generating a living, breathing dinosaur. Perhaps, in the process, we can learn a little more about our own development and our place in this ever changing world.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3

A world-renowned paleontologist takes readers all over the globe to reveal a new science that trumps science fiction: how humans can re-create a dinosaur.

In movies, in novels, in comic strips, and on television, we?ve all seen dinosaurs?or at least somebody?s educated guess of what they would look like. But what if it were possible to build, or grow, a real dinosaur, without finding ancient DNA? Jack Horner, the scientist who advised Steven Spielberg on Jurassic Park, and a pioneer in bringing paleontology into the twenty-first century, teams up with the editor of The New York Times,/I>?s Science Times section to reveal exactly what?s in store.

In the 1980s, Horner began using CAT scans to look inside fossilized dinosaur eggs, and he and his colleagues have been delving deeper ever since. At North Carolina State University, Mary Schweitzer has extracted fossil molecules?proteins that survived 68 million years?from a Tyrannosaurus rex fossil excavated by Horner. These proteins show that T. rex and the modern chicken are kissing cousins. At McGill University, Hans Larsson is manipulating a chicken embryo to awaken the dinosaur within: starting by growing a tail and eventually prompting it to grow the forelimbs of a dinosaur. All of this is happening without changing a single gene.

This incredible research is leading to discoveries and applications so profound they?re scary in the power they confer on humanity. How to Build a Dinosaur is a tour of the hot rocky deserts and air-conditioned laboratories at the forefront of this scientific revolution.

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