No real-life Jurassic park!
Ancient dinosaur DNA is unlikely to survive inside the bodies of insects encased in amber, a new study has found, ruling out the 'Jurassic Park' theory that the giant prehistoric reptiles could one day be resurrected.
The idea of recreating dinosaurs by extracting DNA from insects in amber has held the fascination of the public for two decades, researchers said.
Claims for successful extraction of DNA from ambers up to 130 million-years-old by various scientists in the early 1990s were only seriously questioned when a study at the Natural History Museum, London, was unable to replicate the process.
A new study the University of Manchester can now confirm that the existence of DNA in amber fossils is highly unlikely.
The team led by amber expert Dr David Penney and co-ordinated by ancient DNA expert Professor Terry Brown used highly-sensitive 'next generation' sequencing techniques - the most advance type of DNA sequencing - on insects in copal, the sub-fossilised resin precursor of amber.
"In the original 1990s studies DNA amplification was achieved by a process called the polymerase chain reaction (PCR), which will preferentially amplify any modern, undamaged DNA molecules that contaminate an extract of partially degraded ancient ones to give false positive results that might be mistaken for genuine ancient DNA," Brown said.
"Our approach, using 'next generation' sequencing methods is ideal for ancient DNA because it provides sequences for all the DNA molecules in an extract, regardless of their length, and is less likely to give preference to contaminating modern molecules," said Brown.
The team concluded that their inability to detect ancient DNA in relatively young (60 years to 10,600 years old) sub-fossilised insects in copal, despite using sensitive next generation methods, suggests that the potential for DNA survival in resin inclusions is no better.
It is perhaps worse than that in air-dried museum insects, from which DNA has been retrieved using similar techniques, researchers said.
This raises significant doubts about claims of DNA extraction from fossil insects in amber, many millions of years older than copal.
"Intuitively, one might imagine that the complete and rapid engulfment in resin, resulting in almost instantaneous demise, might promote the preservation of DNA in a resin entombed insect, but this appears not to be the case. So, unfortunately, the Jurassic Park scenario must remain in the realms of fiction," Penney said.
The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE.
