Posted on 04/02/2013 10:13:02 AM PDT by fishtank
Soft Bone Tissue in a Triceratops Fossil
Posted by jlwile on March 27, 2013
A triceratops skull like the one from which the horn in the study came. (click for credit) These are exciting times to be a creationist! Ever since Dr. Mary Schweitzer first demonstrated the existence of soft tissue in a Tyrannosaurus rex fossil that is supposed to be 65 million years old,1 soft tissue is turning up in all sorts of supposedly ancient fossils (see here, here, here, and here for more information). The latest example comes from the Hell Creek Formation in Montana, which is supposed to be about 65 million years old, so the fossil is assumed to be that old as well. The fossil in question is a horn from a Triceratops horridus specimen. After it was collected, it broke in several places, indicating that the fossil had been fractured. Since the fossil was broken, the authors of the study decided to get rid of the “hard parts” of the fossil to see if there was anything soft inside. To do this, they soaked the horn in a weak acid for a month.
As the acid ate away at the minerals that formed the horn, the authors found strips of light brown, soft tissue remaining. Now this soft stuff could be from all manner of things, so the authors decided to do a microscopic study of the tissue, and what they found was was exactly what you would expect to see if you examined the tissue from the bone of a recently deceased animal!2
When they examined the tissue under a light microscope, they found well-defined, circular Haversian systems. In case you aren’t familiar with that term, compact bone is made of cylindrical structures formed by bone cells that are called osteocytes. The drawing below shows what a Haversian system looks like:
Diagram of a Haversian system in compact bone (Click for credit) Note that the center of the cylinder is a canal called the Haversian canal. The authors show that the Haversian canals they saw in the tissue were filled with structures that strongly resemble red blood cells!
Since the tissue looks like compact bone tissue, the most reasonable conclusion is that it comes from the Triceratops fossil. Given that, there is another question to answer: are these Haversian systems fossilized or not? After all, it is possible that the fossilization process is so precise that it preserves structures on the cellular level. Given the fact that the tissue was soft, that’s unlikely, but I suppose it’s still a possibility.
To answer this question, the authors looked at the Haversian systems with a scanning electron microscope, and you can see pictures of what they saw here. The osteocytes that make up the Haversian systems seem completely intact, all the way down to their fragile filipodial extensions. In fact, the authors note:
Filipodial extensions were delicate and showed no evidence of any permineralization or crystallization artifact and therefore were interpreted to be soft.
So it really seems like they were seeing intact, soft osteocytes from a Triceratops fossil found in the Hell Creek Formation. It is hard enough to understand how a bone cell can exist like that for thousands of years. The idea that it has lasted for 65 million years simply boggles the mind.
In my mind, this study is strong evidence against the idea that the fossils in the Hell Creek Formation are millions of years old.
REFERENCES
1. Mary H. Schweitzer, Jennifer L. Wittmeyer, John R. Horner, and Jan K. Toporski, “Soft-Tissue Vessels and Cellular Preservation in Tyrannosaurus rex,” Science, 307:1952-1955, 2005 Return to Text
2. Mark Hollis Armitage and Kevin Lee Anderson, “Soft sheets of fibrillar bone from a fossil of the supraorbital horn of the dinosaur Triceratops horridus,” Acta Histochemica, doi: 10.1016/j.acthis.2013.01.001, 2103
Return to Text
Extraordinary preservation happens, but the circumstances which permit it are rare, and the discovery of the fossils before their destruction by natural processes even more so.
Well the author said he found it mind boggling and I agreed it was surprising. If the author includes such a response within the article then my agreement with the author is indeed in line with the article. Believe me, I’m not the one that dragged the conversation off topic.
So, is it an accurate understanding to say you too choose to ridicule the science of evolution on the basis of the claim that dinosaur tissue must be substantially less than 65 million years old because the idea of it being so old is too ridiculous and improbable to be credible?
Wrong again. Evolution is a fact so far as I’m concerned; modern genetic science proves it incontrovertibly. Creationists probably believe in leprechauns too.
You wrote in part:
“Well the author said he found it mind boggling and I agreed it was surprising. If the author includes such a response within the article then my agreement with the author is indeed in line with the article.”
What you wrote did not unambiguously differentiate whetheer you agrreed only about being mind boggling or mind boggling and the conclusions promoting Creationism by implying evolution was too improbable to ttake seriously. Now you have clearly stated the difference.
I can easily see how another person would be surprised or even startled by the discovery, but not if they took the trouble to become acquainted with the science of how biological matter is destroyed. My own comment about scientific ignorance was based upon the reasonable expectation that the author of the topic was responsible for making himself acquainted with how dinosaur tissue can be expected to become destroyed and preserved before comenting against it while proclaiming ignorance and due to a lack of understanding so profound as to amount to being mind boggling. The mind boggling is significant only to the extent the author used it as the measure for the author’s evidently deliberate and negligent ignorance. Anyone else can of course be mind boggled or otherwise based upon their own knowledge or ignorance of the subject, but not the author who professes to have reason to use this ignorance as a basis for promoting an agenda in the Creationism versus evolution debate.
I’m sure you’ve heard this before. Please go away and leave me alone.
yOU FIRST. yOU REPLIED TO ME.
You can have the last word. I understand children like that.
Aw, c’mon, you know you’re having fun giving me a hard time of it. Why spoil your fun?
You dream.
The 6000 years of reality are so easy for a dreamer to stretch to the point of absurdity. But the evidence laughs at you.
So, does this mean you are one of the Bishop Usher proponents?
I am a YHVH proponent.
His word perfectly proclaims and fully reveals a 7000 year existence of space-time. When its over, I won’t need to tell you. If you had any intellectual coriosity, you would have found it for yourself; its not hidden.
“If you had any intellectual coriosity, you would have found it for yourself; its not hidden.”
On the contrary, I’ve known many different groups of many different faiths who promote the idea of Creation being only some thousands of years in the past. It was only a matter of being polite to ask you which of these faiths you may or may not have been a proponent for their beliefs. It is unfortunate to see you respond to the polite inquiry with a snarky and impolite response.
All you or anyone has to do is study the word and it becomes plain that all creation is in a pattern of sevens.
The end of the seventh millenium will be the end of space-time. We are at the end of the sixth millenium presently.
Seven is the Biblical number representing completion, and spiritual perfection. Six is the number of man. the end of the sixth millenium represents the end of man’s rule on Earth.
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