Paleontologists regularly discover fossilized dinosaur bones, but they sometimes locate footprints and prehistoric shells. On rare occasions, researchers have even identified the ancient indentations of a dinosaur’s skin or feathers. But fossilized cells? Researchers have long assumed such microscopic levels of preservation were impossible.But, once again, nature has proven otherwise.
In a study published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), an international team of paleontologists confirmed the presence of intact biomolecules and mineralized red blood cells inside fossils of a 115-million-year-old dinosaur. Although previous work has suggested similar possibilities, the team’s research is the first to chemically identify oxygen-carrying blood compounds known as heme.
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