Genes From Extinct Tasmanian Tiger Resurrected

Resurrection of DNA Function In Vivo from an Extinct Genome. 2008. A. J. Pask, et al. PLoS ONE 3(5): e2240.

The thylacine, Thylacinus cynocephalus. (a) Young male thylacine in Hobart Zoo in 1928, photograph (Q4437). (b) One of the preserved pouch young specimens (head length 34 mm) from which DNA was extracted, from the Museum Victoria collection. (c-f) The skull of the thylacine (c,e) compared with that of the domestic dog Canis canis (d,f). Scale bar = 5cm.

From the press release:

Researchers have extracted genes from the extinct Tasmanian tiger (thylacine), inserted it into a mouse and observed a biological function – this is a world first for the use of the DNA of an extinct species to induce a functional response in another living organism.

The results showed that the thylacine Col2a1 gene has a similar function in developing cartilage and bone development as the Col2a1 gene does in the mouse.

“Up until now we have only been able to examine gene sequences from extinct animals. This research was developed to go one step further to examine extinct gene function in a whole organism,” he said. The last known Tasmanian tiger died in captivity in the Hobart Zoo in 1936. This enigmatic marsupial carnivore was hunted to extinction in the wild in the early 1900s.

Researchers say fortunately some thylacine pouch young and adult tissues were preserved in alcohol in several museum collections around the world. The research team isolated DNA from 100 year old ethanol fixed specimens. After authenticating this DNA as truly thylacine, it was inserted into mouse embryos and its function examined. The thylacine DNA was resurrected, showing a function in the developing mouse cartilage, which will later form the bone.

Born This Day: Carl E. Akeley

May 19, 1864 - Nov 17, 1926

This is not quite palaeo, but anyone’s who’s been to the AMNH has marveled at the wonderful dioramas and mounts in the Hall of African Mammals.That hall exists thanks to the efforts of Carl Akeley who was the kind of advendurer that Indy Jones could only dream of being. He died on an African expedition in 1926, ten years before this hall was completed and was buried in a place depicted in the Hall's famous Gorilla Diorama. Of course we approach collecting and conservation differently today, but Akeley is to be commended for his love of nature and his desire to present its hidden corners to the world. I wonder if Carl Denham was named after him?

From Today In Science History:

Carl Ethan Akeley was an American naturalist and explorer who developed the taxidermic method for mounting museum displays to show animals in their natural surroundings. His method of applying skin on a finely molded replica of the body of the animal gave results of unprecedented realism and elevated taxidermy from a craft to an art. He mounted the skeleton of the famous African elephant Jumbo. He invented the Akeley cement gun to use while mounting animals, and the Akeley camera which was used to capture the first movies of gorillas.

From the AMNH, “The American Museum of Natural History’s “Akeley Hall of African Mammals” is considered by many to be among the world's greatest museum displays. The Hall is also a monument to Carl Akeley, the innovator who created it. Akeley was a dedicated explorer, taxidermist, sculptor, and photographer who led teams of scientists and artists on several expeditions to Africa during the first two decades of this century. There, he and his colleagues carefully studied, catalogued, and collected the plants and animals that even then were disappearing. He brought many specimens of that world back to the Museum, where he created this hall, with its twenty-eight dioramas.”

This also let’s me plug this wonderful book, “Windows on Nature: The Great Habitat Dioramas of the American Museum of Natural History”. There are also lots of mostly out of print books about Akeley and his work – well worth the effort to find some of them.

World's Biggest 'Baby' Dinosaur Tracks Found in Korea

From Digital Chosunilbo:



The world’s largest fossil of a playground of baby dinosaurs going back over 100 million years has been found in Korea. The Natural Heritage Center under the National Research Institute of Cultural Heritage announced Thursday that it found the fossil trackway of two baby sauropods dating back to 110 million years in Euiseong County, North Gyeongsang Province.

There are a total of 61 footprints stretching over 4.25 meters, making them the largest fossil trackway of baby dinosaurs in the world.

Stephen Jay Gould's Library Donated To Stanford

From the press release:

During his career, Gould assembled what he believed was a definitive library of the history of early paleontology, said Rhonda Shearer, Gould's widow. Now, the collection of books, papers and artifacts that helped inform his writing and teaching is, for the most part, in the Stanford University Libraries, with the balance expected to arrive soon. It is an immense amount of material.

Gould owned approximately 1,500 rare, antiquarian books, some dating back to the late 1400s. His library of more contemporary books numbers roughly 8,000 volumes. Although the total number of papers has yet to be determined, the librarians working on the collection estimate they will stretch more than 500 linear feet—a good deal longer than a football field.

"It's a great acquisition," said University Librarian Michael Keller. "Steve Gould was a tremendous popularizer of science, and he was, more importantly, a deep scientist. He had a big, broad mind, working on lots of different interesting problems."

Perhaps even more surprising than the books he collected is what he did with them.

"He actually used them, and he annotated on many of them in pencil, in the margins," Trujillo said. "He didn't really treat them as artifacts, he treated them as a working research library, and it is clear that is what he did, even though they're really quite amazing rare books."

Keller said the plan is to digitize Gould's articles, as well as the sources from which he drew both inspiration and information, and cross-link the source materials to the endnotes and citations in his writing. The goal will be to make all of Gould's papers freely available over the Internet to anyone who wants to see them, whether schoolchildren or scholars.

Recreating the twists and turns that lead to Gould's different writings should be an interesting process, as the nature of his collection of artifacts suggests. Anyone who found inspiration in items as disparate as a small piece of wood riddled with termite holes or the eye lenses of a flying fish (still stuffed into a small black tube with a tissue stuffed in the open end) probably had an interesting way of looking at things.

This Day In History: Scopes Monkey Trial Law Repealed

From Today In Science History:

On this day in 1967, the governor of Tennessee signed into law the repeal of the 1925 state law prohibiting the teaching of evolution. The original law had made it "unlawful for any teacher in any of the Universities, Normals and all other public schools of the State which are supported in whole or in part by the public school funds of the State, to teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals." It was this law that was tested in what became known as the "Scopes monkey trial." Scopes was found guilty, but acquitted on a technicality upon appeal. The law itself remained a Tennessee state statute for 42 years.

Born This Day: Thomas Davidson

May 17, 1817 – Oct. 14, 1885

Davison was a Scottish naturalist and paleontologist who became known as an authority on brachiopods. His major work, Monograph of British Fossil Brachiopoda, was published by the Palaeontographical Society. Together with supplements, this comprised six quarto volumes with more than 200 plates drawn on stone by the author. Upon his death, he bequeathed his fine collection of recent and fossil brachiopoda to the British Museum.

Danger and Adventure!

I’m still on the road and, frankly, it has been a slow news week. So, why don’t we visit Scott Shaw!’s Oddball Comics site for a behind the scenes look at this issue of Danger and Adventure from 1955.

Today In History: Darwin Starts "The Origin of The Species"

Today In Science History tells us that in 1856, Charles Darwin began writing his book, The Origin of Species, sitting in the study of his country home in Down, England.

So all you graduate students surfing the web -- back to work!

Preservation of Ancient Biomolecules

Paleo © Jim Lawson

The latest issue of Comptes Rendus Palevol has a number of articles on ancient biomolecules and their preservation:

Environment and excavation: Pre-lab impacts on ancient DNA analyses. 2008. Ruth Bollongino et al. Comptes Rendus Palevol

Abstract: Ancient DNA (aDNA) analyses enjoy an increasing role in palaeontological, archaeological and archaeozoological research. The limiting factor for aDNA studies is the degree of DNA preservation. Our study on 291 prehistoric cattle remains from Europe, the Near East and North Africa revealed that DNA preservation is mainly influenced by geographic and climatic conditions. Especially in hot climates, the preservation of sample material is generally low. We observed that these specimens are prone to further degradation and contamination during and after excavation. We give a description of the main caveats and a short guideline for adequate sample handling in order to facilitate the cooperation between archaeologists and geneticists and to improve the outcome of future research.

Comparing rates of recrystallisation and the potential for preservation of biomolecules from the distribution of trace elements in fossil bones. 2008. Clive N. Trueman, et al. Comptes Rendus Palevol

Abstract: Preservation of intact macromolecules and geochemical signals in fossil bones is mainly controlled by the extent of post-mortem interaction between bones and sediment pore waters. Trace elements such as lanthanum are added to bone post-mortem from pore waters, and where uptake occurs via a simple process of diffusion and adsorption, the elemental distribution can be used to assess the relative extent of bone-pore water interaction and rate of recrystallisation. Distribution profiles can be parameterised effectively using simple exponential equations, and the extent of bone–water interaction compared within and between sites. In this study, the distribution of lanthanum within bone was determined by laser ablation ICP–MS in 60 archaeological and fossil bones from Pleistocene and Cretaceous sites. The rates of recrystallisation and potential for preservation of intact biogeochemical signals vary significantly within and between sites. Elemental profiles within fossil bones hold promise as a screening technique to prospect for intact biomolecules and as a taphonomic tool.

Microscopic, chemical and molecular methods for examining fossil preservation. 2008. Mary Higby Schweitzer et al. Comptes Rendus Palevol

Abstract: Advances in technology over the past two decades have resulted in unprecedented access to data from biological specimens. These data have expanded our understanding of physical characteristics, physiological, cellular and subcellular processes, and evolutionary relationships at the molecular level and beyond. Paleontological and archaeological sciences have recently begun to apply these technologies to fossil and subfossil representatives of extinct organisms. Data derived from multidisciplinary, non-traditional techniques can be difficult to decipher, and without a basic understanding of the type of information provided by these methods, their usefulness for fossil studies may be overlooked. This review describes some of these powerful new analytical tools, the data that may be accessible through their use, advantages and limitations, and how they can be applied to fossil material to elucidate characteristics of extinct organisms and their paleoecological environments.

Big Mammals Evolve & Die Out Faster

Higher origination and extinction rates in larger mammals. 2008. L.H. Liow et al. PNAS 105: 6097-6102.

Jimmy Olsen © DC Comics

Abstract: Do large mammals evolve faster than small mammals or vice versa?

Because the answer to this question contributes to our understanding of how life-history affects long-term and large-scale evolutionary patterns, and how microevolutionary rates scale-up to macroevolutionary rates, it has received much attention. A satisfactory or consistent answer to this question is lacking, however.

Here, we take a fresh look at this problem using a large fossil dataset of mammals from the Neogene of the Old World (NOW). Controlling for sampling biases, calculating per capita origination and extinction rates of boundary-crossers and estimating survival probabilities using capture-mark-recapture (CMR) methods, we found the recurring pattern that large mammal genera and species have higher origination and extinction rates, and therefore shorter durations.

This pattern is surprising in the light of molecular studies, which show that smaller animals, with their shorter generation times and higher metabolic rates, have greater absolute rates of evolution.

However, higher molecular rates do not necessarily translate to higher taxon rates because both the biotic and physical environments interact with phenotypic variation, in part fueled by mutations, to affect origination and extinction rates.

To explain the observed pattern, we propose that the ability to evolve and maintain behavior such as hibernation, torpor and burrowing, collectively termed "sleep-or-hide" (SLOH) behavior, serves as a means of environmental buffering during expected and unexpected environmental change. SLOH behavior is more common in some small mammals, and, as a result, SLOH small mammals contribute to higher average survivorship and lower origination probabilities among small mammals.