Dinos and DNA

[biojfm@vaxc.hofstra.edu (John F. Morrissey)]

[ lindbeck@dickinson.edu writes: ]
>  Hello!  I'm a student at Dickinson College currently researching whether 
>the experiments conducted in Jurassic Park (such as cloning dinosaurs and PCR) 
>are possible or if they will soon be possible. What current research has been 
>so far on these subjects? 

Here are a few methods references to seed your search:

Cano, R. J., H. N. Poinar, N. J. Pieniazek, A. Acra and G. O. Poinar Jr. 
1993.  Amplification and sequencing of DNA from a 120-135-million-year-old
weevil.  Nature 363: 536-538.

Diamond, J. M.  1990.  Old dead rats are valuable.  Nature 347: 334-335.

Hagelberg, E., L. S. Bell, T. Allen, A. Boyde, S. J. Jones and J. B. Clegg.
 1991.  Analysis of ancient bone DNA: techniques and applications. 
Philisophical Transactions of the Royal Society, London 333(1268): 399-406.

Hagelberg, E., B. Sykes and R. Hedges.  1989.  Ancient bone DNA amplified. 
Nature 342: 485.

Houde, P. and M. J. Braun.  1988.  Museum collections as a source of DNA
for studies of avian phylogeny.  Auk 105: 773-776.

Lindahl, T.  1993.  Instability and decay of the primary structure of DNA. 
Nature 362: 709-715.

Morell, V.  1993.  Dino DNA: the hunt and the hype.  Science 261: 160-162.

Polnar, H. N., R. J. Cano and G. O. Polnar Jr.  1993.  DNA from an extinct
plant.  Nature 363: 677.


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John F. Morrissey
Assistant Professor
Department of Biology
114 Hofstra University
Hempstead, NY 11550-1090
516-463-5517
FAX: 516-565-0098
E-mail: biojfm@vaxc.hofstra.edu
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