February 25, 2009
Which Dinosaur Would You Clone?
Charles R. Knight's 1896 painting of Dryptosaurus. From Wikipedia.
When the film adaptation of Jurassic Park came out in 1993 the idea that scientists may one day be able to clone dinosaurs had everybody talking. It is still more science fiction than science fact (check out The Science of Jurassic Park and the Lost World), but suppose for a moment that there was some breakthrough that allowed scientists to bring back the dinosaurs. Which dinosaur would you want to see brought back to life?
I know it would be difficult for me to choose. There are just so many fascinating dinosaurs that I would love to see them all in the flesh. If I had to pick just one, though, I think I would vote for Dryptosaurus. It is not a particularly popular dinosaur but it was very significant in revolutionizing the image of dinosaurs in the late 19th century. Found in my home state of New Jersey in 1866, it was one of the first dinosaurs to confirm that some of them walked on two legs and had bird-like characteristics.
What did Dryptosaurus look like? It is hard to say. Enough of its skeleton has been found to determine that it was a tyrannosauroid and may have been similar to Eotyrannus from England, but it is still only known from bits and pieces. Many of the sites in which more Dryptosaurus fossils might be found have either been closed down or built over by suburban sprawl, too, so we may never get a more complete understanding of this dinosaur. That’s why I would love to see it restored.
How about you? If you could tell scientists to clone any dinosaur which one would you choose?
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I didn’t even have to think about this one.
Deinocheirus, because that puppy has been driving me nuts for years.
Brian knows this already, but Deinocheirus is the name applied to a shoulder girdle and a pair of arms from Mongolia. Those arms are more than eight feet long…
I’ve read that they seem to be from an ostrich-mimic — but the mystery inherent in such a spectacular set of partial remains has has me itching with curiosity since I first read of them. I felt an overwhelming sense of relief when they found out about the nature of Therizinosaurus. I hope to feel the same thing about Deinocheirus some day.
Oooh! Good choice, Sean!
What I am wondering is why there were extraordinarily large coelurosaurs running around Asia in the Cretaceous. There was Therizinosaurus, Deinocheirus, and Gigantoraptor; why did these theropods get to be so big? In the former two the only thing we have are the arms, but if these were secondarily herbivorous or omnivorous theropods I have to wonder if they were invading a niche left open by sauropods or other herbivorous browsers.
I’ll go with Baryonyx walkeri. No particular reason, except that it was always one of my favourites since I was little. Other than that, a therizinosaur would be cool.
Brian, I hadn’t even thought about that. Man. Land Of The Thunder Chickens — or would that be Geese, if they were herbivores?
Now that’s an extra-weird bestiary even by Mesozoic standards — and we’ll probably never find out about the really strange stuff.
I changed my mind — I want to clone one of the dinosaurs we’ll never find as a fossil…
Any of the small maniraptorans. Because we will never have an absolutely escape proof enclosure, and I’d much prefer to deal with an animal I greatly outmatch in combat.
I was just about to comment exactly as Alan above, but I think I’d go with the genuine Velociraptor. I’d loved Deinonychus since I was a kid, then adored them in Jurassic Park. Soon after, I started obsessing over them in their real 2.5ft form. Small enough to be little real danger in a post-apocalyptic world sense, large enough and snappy enough to capture the public’s fear and imagination, and that awesome name.
Not to mention the awesome of seeing what kind of feathering they had all over.
Alan, your basic concept there is the exact opposite of my own thoughts — my first impulse is to satisfy my curiosity. If I discard that impulse, I’d be making my selection on the basis of, “What would be good at eating people?”
Actually, the Dryptosaur might be a good choice…
[...] and gigantic mosasaurs prowled the near-shore waters, and the dinosaurs Hadrosaurus and Dryptosaurus inhabited the land not too far from the ancient beach. When these dinosaurs died, sometimes their [...]
i want to be a gigantosaurus