Researchers led by Curtin University in Australia found fossilized red blood cells containing heme molecules in the limb bones of Aratasaurus museunacionali, a meat-eating theropod dinosaur from northeastern Brazil, the university said in a release republished by ScienceDaily on Nov. 6. The study appeared in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Related: Mars Meteorite Teghaza 001 Formed More Than 4.1 Billion Years Ago, NASA Study Finds.
What the team found
The researchers identified many mineralized red blood cells inside vascular canals, the passages that once held blood vessels, Curtin said. Chemical analysis detected preserved heme, a component of hemoglobin, the protein that carries oxygen in red blood cells. The team also found amino acids associated with collagen, according to the release.
Curtin called it the first definitive chemical confirmation of hemoglobin-derived molecules inside fossilized dinosaur red blood cells. Earlier studies had found structures resembling blood cells but had not confirmed those molecules, the university said.
How the blood survived
The researchers linked the preservation to hausmannite, a mineral that helped stabilize the cells and their molecules, Curtin said. They suspect the animal was buried quickly in sediment with little oxygen and heavy microbial activity, according to the release.
Lead researcher Kliti Grice, a John Curtin Distinguished Professor, said in the release that detecting intact heme-derived molecules in cells that old was “astonishing.”
Who did the work
The team included scientists from Curtin, the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Brazil’s National Museum, the Regional University of Cariri and Johns Hopkins University, Curtin said. The study is titled “Heme signatures in mineralized red blood cells within vascular canals of a 115-million-year-old dinosaur bone.”
What happens next
Grice said the method could help researchers study the evolution of blood, metabolism and activity levels in extinct animals. Curtin said the findings could also guide searches for traces of ancient life in extreme environments beyond Earth. More research news is in the Science section.
Sources
- ScienceDaily (Curtin University release): Scientists just found dinosaur blood that survived 115 million years
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: Heme signatures in mineralized red blood cells within vascular canals of a 115-million-year-old dinosaur bone
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