As far-fetched as it sounds to recreate dinosaurs from ancient DNA, the premise of the film "Jurassic Park" slithers along the edge of scientific plausibility, biologists say. In fact, some admit that the book and movie give them ethical shivers about doing real-world genetic research that might someday make it possible to copy living or dead animals, or even human beings. With all of the different advances we have had over recent years, it only seems correct to assume that in the near future, cloning of humans and newer species will be possible. In the movie, the scientists used a combination of cloning and recombinant DNA. As the scientist in the movie stated, we get so involved in the 'could' of DNA research, but we must continue asking ourselves if we 'should'. This may seem like a serious moral dilemma for some people, but not for me. Of course I would genetically alter DNA to create dinosaurs. Wouldn't everybody? Our lives would be significantly easier with access to dinosaurs. Late for class? Just hop on your Pterodactyl, and you'll be there on time. Hit rush hour traffic, no worries, you took your T-Rex today and when you take "Reptar" out for a spin, everyone yields for you. Dinosaurs were alive when Fred and Wilma Flintstone were living, and their life was just dandy. My point is, dinosaurs would benefit society, maybe.
The only way we'd ever be able to recreate dinosaurs is if we find traces of DNA from living tissue or preserved blood, so we could reconstruct the DNA sequence. So it is semi-possible. The hardest part would be finding enough prehistoric dinosaur blood that is perfectly preserved, so it could be inspected, spliced and altered. You would need hundreds of nuclei to recreate the DNA sequence. Scientists would also need to know the complete dinosaur genome to determine what has been damaged. Actually, Jurassic Park is pure science fiction, a very well written science fiction novel / film.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment