In 1993, Newsweek ran an article affirming the scientific plausibility of Jurassic Park. They pointed out that two Berkeley scientists announced that they had cloned 40m-year-old bee DNA after finding the insect preserved in amber.
But to replicate a dinosaur genome, you would need billions of DNA building blocks. They could not harvest more than 250. Moreover, the amber-based experiments of the bee DNA finding were likely based on false results. Lastly, no one has ever found any dinosaur DNA since DNA degrades over time.

Plausibility of Jurassic Park

A controversial palaeontologist thinks we might have all the DNA necessary to recreate dinosaurs - in chickens.
Scientists managed to tweak poultry DNA to grow alligator-like teeth and a dinosaur-like snout instead of a beak. The creatures would not be recreations of a once-extinct species but a human-engineered version of how they think dinosaurs have been.

Dinosaurs: Maybe life can find a way

Spielberg might have claimed the 90s classic ‘depends on credibility’ – but with no dinosaur DNA, get set for fewer ferocious beasts and more … chickens<figure><picture itemprop="contentUrl"><source srcset="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=620&amp;quality=45&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;dpr=2&amp;s=e044513f71f0c35a2a45eff62e6242d9 1240w, https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=605&amp;quality=45&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;dpr=2&amp;s=5f184bf18119607d0cfea21ea88f3fb3 1210w, https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=445&amp;quality=45&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;dpr=2&amp;s=e4eb8bd2a00da0d2a3ca16d880dffed4 890w" sizes="(min-width: 660px) 620px, 100vw" media="(-webkit-min-device-pixel-ratio: 1.25), (min-resolution: 120dpi)"><source srcset="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=620&amp;quality=85&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;s=95b208a8a159fc11e506c8df5a17fde7 620w, https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=605&amp;quality=85&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;s=bb2c36957bb803ddfec0d2aec8247b29 605w, https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=445&amp;quality=85&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;s=4101438735cfe4f33c1a2bd34c0f4fe4 445w" sizes="(min-width: 660px) 620px, 100vw"><img alt="Clone rangers ... Laura Dern and Sam Neill in Jurassic Park." src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f234cb3984c05fca130cea9a29005823a3ac45c0/0_358_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=445&amp;quality=45&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;dpr=2&amp;s=e4eb8bd2a00da0d2a3ca16d880dffed4" height="407" width="678"></picture><figcaption dir="auto">Clone rangers ... Laura Dern and Sam Neill in Jurassic Park. Photograph: Allstar/Universal</figcaption></figure><div><label for="dateToggle">Mon 22 Feb 2021 08.00 EST</label></div>Last modified on Tue 23 Feb 2021 03.19 EST<div data-testid="long-share-count" aria-hidden="true">61</div>In the Guide’s weekly Solved! column, we look into a crucial pop-culture question you’ve been burning to know the answer to – and settle it, once and for allDon’t pretend you’ve never thought about it. Yes, yes – there’s the odd teensy downside to populating an island with once-extinct reptiles. Sure, the T rex turns out to show a disregard for road safety. And velociraptors’ approach to hide and seek is frankly unsportsmanlike. But the majestic song of the brachiosaurus! The incredible dino-flocks! The glistening magnificence of Jeff Goldblum’s chest rug! Could Jurassic Park happen in real life?Back in 1993, it seemed like it. Newsweek ran an article attesting to<a href="https://www.newsweek.com/how-far-were-we-real-jurassic-park-1993-943428" title="" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr"> the scientific plausibility of Jurassic Park</a>, pointing to the fact that – during filming – two Berkeley scientists announced that they had cloned 40m-year-old bee DNA after finding the insect preserved in amber. “This movie depends on credibility,” Spielberg told Newsweek. “The credibility of the premise – that dinosaurs could come back to life through cloning – is what allowed the movie to be made.”But there were problems even then. To replicate a dinosaur genome, you would need billions of DNA’s building blocks, base pairs. But none of the ancient DNA they harvested had more than 250. Which is like unboxing a 10,000-piece T rex jigsaw to find two corner pieces and a bit of tooth. And, in the last few years, the University of Manchester’s <a href="https://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/the-final-nail-in-the-jurassic-park-coffin/" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr">amber-based experiments</a> have shown that the bee DNA findings were likely to be based on false results, anyway. Plus, there’s one other teeny obstacle to setting up Jurassic Park: no one has actually ever found any dinosaur DNA. Scientists know that DNA degrades over time, and the oldest DNA ever found is <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/feb/17/million-year-old-mammoth-genomes-set-record-for-ancient-dna" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr">about a million years old</a>. The dinosaur DNA you need would have had to survive around 65m years.<figure><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/cbb165679b74d16c15a4dd3e9b75ae28f2d3cb3d/0_0_1000_600/master/1000.jpg?width=460&amp;quality=85&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;s=a0b5e929b44d70d53bc4060183b111f8" alt="" width="140" height="84"><figcaption dir="auto">The Guide: Staying In – sign up for our home entertainment tips
Read more</figcaption></figure>Perhaps life can find a way, though. A controversial palaeontologist – who also just happens to be a scientific consultant to the Jurassic Park franchise – thinks that we might have all the DNA we need: in chickens. Scientists have managed to tweak poultry DNA to grow alligator-like teeth and a <a href="http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150512-bird-grows-face-of-dinosaur?referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ecosia.org%2F" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr">dinosaur-like snout</a> instead of a beak. Still, given that the project is often referred to as “chickenosaurus”, it might not be quite the awe-inspiring spectacle Spielberg had in mind.On top of that, you can also consider the cretaceous plant species that give <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/jurassic-park" data-component="auto-linked-tag" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr">Jurassic Park</a> its lush, verdant quality to be a write-off (how were they even meant to have got the plant DNA out of a mosquito? Catch it during Veganuary?). And, obviously, the creatures would not be recreations of once-dead species such as T rex, but a human-engineered version of how we believe dinosaurs to have been. They might lack the same majesty as in the film, especially given that – knowing the link between dinosaurs and birds – things might also be a tad downier than on-screen.So, Jurassic Park’s vision of scientists genetically engineering dinosaur-like creatures could happen. Will they be installed inside an awe-inspiring theme park featuring Jeep-based tours? Less likely, but who knows? You’d hope not, given that we’re now five films deep into seeing how they end up turning humanity into a mid-morning snack. In the words of Jeff Goldblum: sometimes we get so preoccupied with whether we could, we don’t stop to think if we should. This article was amended on 22 February 2021. An earlier version stated that the oldest DNA ever found was from an 800,000-year-old ancestor of humans. However, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/feb/17/million-year-old-mammoth-genomes-set-record-for-ancient-dna" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr">scientists recently said they had sequenced DNA from mammoths</a> believed to be more than a million years old.<div data-print-layout="hide">Topics</div>

Spielberg might have claimed the 90s classic ‘depends on credibility’ – but with no dinosaur DNA, get set for fewer ferocious beasts and more … chickens

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Spielberg might have claimed the 90s classic ‘depends on credibility’ – but with no dinosaur DNA, get set for fewer ferocious beasts and more … chickens

Last modified on Tue 23 Feb 2021 03.19 EST

In the Guide’s weekly Solved! column, we look into a crucial pop-culture question you’ve been burning to know the answer to – and settle it, once and for all

Don’t pretend you’ve never thought about it. Yes, yes – there’s the odd teensy downside to populating an island with once-extinct reptiles. Sure, the T rex turns out to show a disregard for road safety. And velociraptors’ approach to hide and seek is frankly unsportsmanlike. But the majestic song of the brachiosaurus! The incredible dino-flocks! The glistening magnificence of Jeff Goldblum’s chest rug! Could Jurassic Park happen in real life?

Back in 1993, it seemed like it. Newsweek ran an article attesting to<a data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr" href="https://www.newsweek.com/how-far-were-we-real-jurassic-park-1993-943428" title="">the scientific plausibility of Jurassic Park </a>, pointing to the fact that – during filming – two Berkeley scientists announced that they had cloned 40m-year-old bee DNA after finding the insect preserved in amber. “This movie depends on credibility,” Spielberg told Newsweek. “The credibility of the premise – that dinosaurs could come back to life through cloning – is what allowed the movie to be made.”

But there were problems even then. To replicate a dinosaur genome, you would need billions of DNA’s building blocks, base pairs. But none of the ancient DNA they harvested had more than 250. Which is like unboxing a 10,000-piece T rex jigsaw to find two corner pieces and a bit of tooth. And, in the last few years, the University of Manchester’s <a data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr" href="https://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/the-final-nail-in-the-jurassic-park-coffin/">amber-based experiments </a>have shown that the bee DNA findings were likely to be based on false results, anyway. Plus, there’s one other teeny obstacle to setting up Jurassic Park: no one has actually ever found any dinosaur DNA. Scientists know that DNA degrades over time, and the oldest DNA ever found is <a data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr" href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/feb/17/million-year-old-mammoth-genomes-set-record-for-ancient-dna">about a million years old </a>. The dinosaur DNA you need would have had to survive around 65m years.

Perhaps life can find a way, though. A controversial palaeontologist – who also just happens to be a scientific consultant to the Jurassic Park franchise – thinks that we might have all the DNA we need: in chickens. Scientists have managed to tweak poultry DNA to grow alligator-like teeth and a <a data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr" href="http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150512-bird-grows-face-of-dinosaur?referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ecosia.org%2F">dinosaur-like snout </a>instead of a beak. Still, given that the project is often referred to as “chickenosaurus”, it might not be quite the awe-inspiring spectacle Spielberg had in mind.

On top of that, you can also consider the cretaceous plant species that give <a data-component="auto-linked-tag" data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr" href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/jurassic-park">Jurassic Park </a>its lush, verdant quality to be a write-off (how were they even meant to have got the plant DNA out of a mosquito? Catch it during Veganuary?). And, obviously, the creatures would not be recreations of once-dead species such as T rex, but a human-engineered version of how we believe dinosaurs to have been. They might lack the same majesty as in the film, especially given that – knowing the link between dinosaurs and birds – things might also be a tad downier than on-screen.

So, Jurassic Park’s vision of scientists genetically engineering dinosaur-like creatures could happen. Will they be installed inside an awe-inspiring theme park featuring Jeep-based tours? Less likely, but who knows? You’d hope not, given that we’re now five films deep into seeing how they end up turning humanity into a mid-morning snack. In the words of Jeff Goldblum: sometimes we get so preoccupied with whether we could, we don’t stop to think if we should.

This article was amended on 22 February 2021. An earlier version stated that the oldest DNA ever found was from an 800,000-year-old ancestor of humans. However, <a data-link-name="in body link" dir="ltr" href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/feb/17/million-year-old-mammoth-genomes-set-record-for-ancient-dna">scientists recently said they had sequenced DNA from mammoths </a>believed to be more than a million years old.

Reality bites: Could Jurassic Park actually happen?

Plausibility of Jurassic Park

Dinosaurs: Maybe life can find a way

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