Latest news with #ancientproteins
CBC
3 days ago
- Science
- CBC
Proteins from rhino fossil found in Nunavut crater dated to 20 million years
Social Sharing Scientists studying a 21-to 24-million-year-old rhino fossil found in the Haughton Crater on Nunavut's Devon Island say the high Arctic environment preserved the oldest recoverable ancient proteins found so far. The proteins recovered from the rhino tooth, found decades ago, are 10 times older than any previously recoverable sample of ancient DNA, said Danielle Fraser, the Canadian Museum of Nature's head of paleobiology and one of the research scientists involved in the study. The researchers, whose findings were published Wednesday in the journal Nature, say their ability to time stamp the proteins well into "deep time" was made possible with newer technologies, and they say that should encourage future paleontological work in the world's coldest places to gather similarly preserved fossils. Reconstructing evolution was previously limited to four-million-year-old samples and the ancient proteins identified so far reached only into the middle-late miocene, roughly 10 million years ago. Ancient DNA does not typically survive beyond one million years, but the high Arctic's dry, cold environment, and the hardiness of tooth enamel, kept the proteins in the rhino fossil intact. In a lab in Copenhagen, scientists successfully extracted and sequenced data from the proteins inside the tooth, Fraser said. "It's very clear that the Arctic is creating a freezer allowing these proteins in these animals to be preserved over much longer time periods than we would expect. This really extends our ability to understand evolution back much farther than we previously thought," said Fraser. To understand deep time, Fraser says, imagine a clock representing the entire history of the evolution of life on earth. "Humans are the last few milliseconds on that clock right before you hit the 12," she said. "And that 23 million years is going to be about five minutes ago." This scientific study analyzed highly-preserved fossils by looking at their ancient proteins, rather than morphology — what the bones look like compared to each other — to determine an extinct species' evolutionary path. Rhinos once lived across the world, with some debate about whether the species originated in Asia or North America. Ancient DNA science can provide better insight into how and when they evolved, said Fraser. Rhino evolution Modern rhinos are thought to have diverged from other rhinocerotids during the Middle Eocene-Oligocene, between 25 and 41 million years ago. The study's authors say their research supports the divergence of two main subfamilies of rhinos (Elasmotheriinae and Rhinocerotinae), and a bone analysis suggests a more recent split, roughly 22 to 34 million years ago. The unique environment of the Haughton Crater on Devon Island is promising for future studies on preserved proteins, said Fraser. The rhino fossil was collected decades ago by the late Mary Dawson, a vertebrate paleontologist from Pittsburgh's Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Dawson collected it in 1986 at a time when protein extraction and ancient DNA technology "effectively didn't exist," according to Fraser. Fraser said in recent years, teams working on Devon Island or Ellesmere Island have worked with local community members like Jarloo Kiguktak of Grise Fiord, Nunavut. Kiguktak, an experienced fossil collector, said he joins the researchers on their search for specimens. How did they do it? The study's authors say they sequenced enamel proteins from the rhino fossil and more than 1,000 amino acid chains (peptides), which are the building blocks of proteins. They confirmed the proteins were ancient by matching the signs of age-related damage to expected burial conditions more than 20 million years ago in the Arctic environment, the researchers said. Dental enamel is the hardest material of vertebrates and it protects the proteins from breaking down over time, the research states. Fraser said while paleontology may sometimes be seen as "nerds studying their dinosaurs," these findings allow for reconstruction of molecular patterns. "We are nerds, and we love studying our fossils," she said.
CNN
3 days ago
- Science
- CNN
Scientists recover proteins from a 24 million-year-old rhino fossil. Are dinosaurs next?
Scientists have recovered ancient proteins from a fossilized rhinoceros tooth, breaking new ground in the study of ancient life on Earth. The 24 million-year-old tooth, which was unearthed in the Canadian Arctic, contains proteins that are 10 times older than the most ancient known DNA. Using the sample, scientists have now analyzed the oldest detailed protein sequence on record. 'Enamel is so hard it protects these proteins over deep time (long time scales),' said Ryan Sinclair Paterson, a postdoctoral researcher at the Globe Institute at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark who led the Canadian research. 'It's essentially like a vault. What we did was unlock this vault, at least for this specific fossil.' The study of ancient DNA preserved in bones, fossils and dirt has revolutionized archaeological science, pulling back the curtain on lost empires, mysterious clans, ice age creatures and previously unknown human species. Ancient proteins promise a similar revolution for fossils that are many millions of years old and currently beyond the chronological reach of ancient DNA. The study, which published July 9 in the scientific journal Nature, showcases the enormous potential of the field, known as paleoproteomics. Proteins, which are made up of sequences of amino acids, are more robust than DNA, a fragile molecule that degrades relatively easily. Although proteins contain less detailed information, they can help to elucidate a specimen's evolutionary history, diet, even in some cases the sex of a fossil. 'The next step is to demonstrate that it's not just one sample, one lucky strike,' said coauthor Enrico Cappellini, a professor at the University of Copenhagen's Globe Institute who has pioneered methods to extricate proteins from fossils and was involved in the Canadian research. 'But potentially there's a huge area of research that could be further clarified and then, if we really push it farther … we could even start to investigate dinosaurs,' he added. Cappellini and Paterson, along with colleagues at the University of York and the Canadian Museum of Nature, recovered sequences from seven proteins preserved inside the fossilized rhino tooth. Sequencing ancient proteins involves determining the order of amino acids in a sample. By comparing the sequences with those of living and extinct relatives, the scientists were able to glean information about the evolution of the rhino. The analysis revealed that it diverged from the same family as living rhinos about 41 million to 25 million years ago. 'In the fossil record, there were some crazy forms (of rhinoceros species). There's the woolly rhinoceros, and maybe you've heard of the Siberian unicorn with the gigantic horn,' Paterson said. 'What we were able to do is compare our mystery rhino with other forms and find out where it falls in the family tree.' Separate research, also published July 9 in the journal Nature, which sampled fossils from Kenya's Turkana Basin, suggests that biomolecules can survive for millions of years, even in searing, tropical environments. The study, which analyzed 10 mammal fossils, including the relatives of today's elephants, hippos and rhinos, was published by researchers at the Smithsonian Institution's Museum Conservation Institute and Harvard University. They recovered proteins from five of the fossils dated 1.5 million to 18 million years ago, and found that even in tropical regions with high temperatures scientists can extract prehistoric proteins, which can reveal links between ancient elephants and rhinos and their modern-day relatives. While the information contained in the Kenyan proteins wasn't as detailed as that found in the Canadian fossil, the authors said that their presence within enamel tissues in one of the world's warmest regions holds promise that proteins in much older fossils could be discovered. 'We were excitingly successful. We went back to about 18 million years. I think going back in time should be possible,' said study author Timothy Cleland, a physical scientist at the Museum Conservation Institute. The research on the Canadian fossil was 'sound and super interesting,' said Maarten Dhaenens, a researcher at the University of Ghent in Belgium who specializes in proteomics. However, Dhaenens, who wasn't involved in either study, said the methodology used on the Kenyan fossils was complex and less tested. The researchers' findings, he argued, are harder to interpret and warranted a more thorough assessment. 'The data is publicly available, so we should be able to verify their claims through manual validation, but this takes time,' he said via email. Evan Saitta, paleontologist and research associate at Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History, said it was 'shocking' to find proteins preserved within fossils at tropical latitudes and added that the findings needed replication. It had been previously assumed that cold temperatures were necessary to slow down the breakdown of proteins. 'If that is a true result … it should be very easy to replicate,' he noted. 'We should be able to go around all different fossil sites all over the world and find enamel peptides (proteins).' Getting proteins from fossils this old would be a palaeontologist's dream come true, said Matthew Collins, the McDonald Professor in Palaeoproteomics at the UK's University of Cambridge, who agreed that the research on the Canadian fossil was more convincing. Collins, like Saitta, was not involved in the new research. 'This is amazing. It's really exciting, but at the same time I've been disappointed so much in my career by thinking that we had very old proteins and we didn't,' added Collins, who has tried to recover proteins from dinosaur fossils. Collins and Saitta were part of a team that detected amino acids in a titanosaur eggshell fragment, according to research published in 2024. The egg was laid by a plant-eating sauropod, a huge, long-necked dinosaur that lived in the Late Cretaceous, shortly before dinosaurs went extinct 66 million years ago. However, the dinosaur eggshell lacked any identifiable protein sequences. Their results were akin to identifying five letters in a novel, revealing only a pattern of decay that showed there were once proteins in the eggshell, said Saitta. 'There's no sequence left, no information, just the little individual Lego building blocks of (amino acids),' Collins said. Discover your world Go beyond the headlines and explore the latest scientific achievements and fascinating discoveries. Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Getting protein information from a dinosaur tooth is a long shot, and Saitta noted that he had given up looking for proteins in dinosaur fossils in favor of exploring more interesting research questions. Not only are dinosaur fossils far older than the fossils in the two studies, he noted, but they mostly date back to a hothouse period in the global climate when there were no ice caps. What's more, on average, dinosaur fossils are buried far deeper and thus have experienced far greater geothermal heat. It's also not clear whether dinosaur teeth had thick enough enamel to preserve proteins, he added. Cappellini and Paterson said it might be possible to retrieve useful protein information from dinosaur fossils within 10 years, although there were other interesting questions to investigate first, such as how mammals came to dominate the planet after the dinosaurs' demise. 'I really think some sites might preserve dinosaur proteins in deep time. Maybe we can give those a shot,' Paterson said.
CNN
3 days ago
- Science
- CNN
Scientists recover proteins from a 24 million-year-old rhino fossil. Are dinosaurs next?
Scientists have recovered ancient proteins from a fossilized rhinoceros tooth, breaking new ground in the study of ancient life on Earth. The 24 million-year-old tooth, which was unearthed in the Canadian Arctic, contains proteins that are 10 times older than the most ancient known DNA. Using the sample, scientists have now analyzed the oldest detailed protein sequence on record. 'Enamel is so hard it protects these proteins over deep time (long time scales),' said Ryan Sinclair Paterson, a postdoctoral researcher at the Globe Institute at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark who led the Canadian research. 'It's essentially like a vault. What we did was unlock this vault, at least for this specific fossil.' The study of ancient DNA preserved in bones, fossils and dirt has revolutionized archaeological science, pulling back the curtain on lost empires, mysterious clans, ice age creatures and previously unknown human species. Ancient proteins promise a similar revolution for fossils that are many millions of years old and currently beyond the chronological reach of ancient DNA. The study, which published July 9 in the scientific journal Nature, showcases the enormous potential of the field, known as paleoproteomics. Proteins, which are made up of sequences of amino acids, are more robust than DNA, a fragile molecule that degrades relatively easily. Although proteins contain less detailed information, they can help to elucidate a specimen's evolutionary history, diet, even in some cases the sex of a fossil. 'The next step is to demonstrate that it's not just one sample, one lucky strike,' said coauthor Enrico Cappellini, a professor at the University of Copenhagen's Globe Institute who has pioneered methods to extricate proteins from fossils and was involved in the Canadian research. 'But potentially there's a huge area of research that could be further clarified and then, if we really push it farther … we could even start to investigate dinosaurs,' he added. Cappellini and Paterson, along with colleagues at the University of York and the Canadian Museum of Nature, recovered sequences from seven proteins preserved inside the fossilized rhino tooth. Sequencing ancient proteins involves determining the order of amino acids in a sample. By comparing the sequences with those of living and extinct relatives, the scientists were able to glean information about the evolution of the rhino. The analysis revealed that it diverged from the same family as living rhinos about 41 million to 25 million years ago. 'In the fossil record, there were some crazy forms (of rhinoceros species). There's the woolly rhinoceros, and maybe you've heard of the Siberian unicorn with the gigantic horn,' Paterson said. 'What we were able to do is compare our mystery rhino with other forms and find out where it falls in the family tree.' Separate research, also published July 9 in the journal Nature, which sampled fossils from Kenya's Turkana Basin, suggests that biomolecules can survive for millions of years, even in searing, tropical environments. The study, which analyzed 10 mammal fossils, including the relatives of today's elephants, hippos and rhinos, was published by researchers at the Smithsonian Institution's Museum Conservation Institute and Harvard University. They recovered proteins from five of the fossils dated 1.5 million to 18 million years ago, and found that even in tropical regions with high temperatures scientists can extract prehistoric proteins, which can reveal links between ancient elephants and rhinos and their modern-day relatives. While the information contained in the Kenyan proteins wasn't as detailed as that found in the Canadian fossil, the authors said that their presence within enamel tissues in one of the world's warmest regions holds promise that proteins in much older fossils could be discovered. 'We were excitingly successful. We went back to about 18 million years. I think going back in time should be possible,' said study author Timothy Cleland, a physical scientist at the Museum Conservation Institute. The research on the Canadian fossil was 'sound and super interesting,' said Maarten Dhaenens, a researcher at the University of Ghent in Belgium who specializes in proteomics. However, Dhaenens, who wasn't involved in either study, said the methodology used on the Kenyan fossils was complex and less tested. The researchers' findings, he argued, are harder to interpret and warranted a more thorough assessment. 'The data is publicly available, so we should be able to verify their claims through manual validation, but this takes time,' he said via email. Evan Saitta, paleontologist and research associate at Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History, said it was 'shocking' to find proteins preserved within fossils at tropical latitudes and added that the findings needed replication. It had been previously assumed that cold temperatures were necessary to slow down the breakdown of proteins. 'If that is a true result … it should be very easy to replicate,' he noted. 'We should be able to go around all different fossil sites all over the world and find enamel peptides (proteins).' Getting proteins from fossils this old would be a palaeontologist's dream come true, said Matthew Collins, the McDonald Professor in Palaeoproteomics at the UK's University of Cambridge, who agreed that the research on the Canadian fossil was more convincing. Collins, like Saitta, was not involved in the new research. 'This is amazing. It's really exciting, but at the same time I've been disappointed so much in my career by thinking that we had very old proteins and we didn't,' added Collins, who has tried to recover proteins from dinosaur fossils. Collins and Saitta were part of a team that detected amino acids in a titanosaur eggshell fragment, according to research published in 2024. The egg was laid by a plant-eating sauropod, a huge, long-necked dinosaur that lived in the Late Cretaceous, shortly before dinosaurs went extinct 66 million years ago. However, the dinosaur eggshell lacked any identifiable protein sequences. Their results were akin to identifying five letters in a novel, revealing only a pattern of decay that showed there were once proteins in the eggshell, said Saitta. 'There's no sequence left, no information, just the little individual Lego building blocks of (amino acids),' Collins said. Discover your world Go beyond the headlines and explore the latest scientific achievements and fascinating discoveries. Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Getting protein information from a dinosaur tooth is a long shot, and Saitta noted that he had given up looking for proteins in dinosaur fossils in favor of exploring more interesting research questions. Not only are dinosaur fossils far older than the fossils in the two studies, he noted, but they mostly date back to a hothouse period in the global climate when there were no ice caps. What's more, on average, dinosaur fossils are buried far deeper and thus have experienced far greater geothermal heat. It's also not clear whether dinosaur teeth had thick enough enamel to preserve proteins, he added. Cappellini and Paterson said it might be possible to retrieve useful protein information from dinosaur fossils within 10 years, although there were other interesting questions to investigate first, such as how mammals came to dominate the planet after the dinosaurs' demise. 'I really think some sites might preserve dinosaur proteins in deep time. Maybe we can give those a shot,' Paterson said.
Yahoo
10-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Proteins from rhino fossil found in Nunavut crater dated to 20 million years
Scientists studying a 21 to 24-million-year-old rhino fossil found in the Haughton Crater on Nunavut's Devon Island say the high Arctic environment preserved the oldest recoverable ancient proteins found so far. The proteins recovered from the rhino tooth, found decades ago, are 10 times older than any previously recoverable sample of ancient DNA, said Danielle Fraser, the Canadian Museum of Nature's head of paleobiology and one of the research scientists involved in the study. The researchers, whose findings were published Wednesday in the journal Nature, say their ability to time stamp the proteins well into "deep time" was made possible with newer technologies, and they say that should encourage future paleontological work in the world's coldest places to gather similarly preserved fossils. Reconstructing evolution was previously limited to four-million-year-old samples and the ancient proteins identified so far reached only into the middle-late miocene, roughly 10 million years ago. Ancient DNA does not typically survive beyond one million years, but the high Arctic's dry, cold environment, and the hardiness of tooth enamel, kept the proteins in the rhino fossil intact. In a lab in Copenhagen, scientists successfully extracted and sequenced data from the proteins inside the tooth, Fraser said. "It's very clear that the Arctic is creating a freezer allowing these proteins in these animals to be preserved over much longer time periods than we would expect. This really extends our ability to understand evolution back much farther than we previously thought," said Fraser. To understand deep time, Fraser says, imagine a clock representing the entire history of the evolution of life on earth. "Humans are the last few milliseconds on that clock right before you hit the 12," she said. "And that 23 million years is going to be about five minutes ago." This scientific study analyzed highly-preserved fossils by looking at their ancient proteins, rather than morphology — what the bones look like compared to each other — to determine an extinct species' evolutionary path. Rhinos once lived across the world, with some debate about whether the species originated in Asia or North America. Ancient DNA science can provide better insight into how and when they evolved, said Fraser. Modern rhinos are thought to have diverged from other rhinocerotids during the Middle Eocene-Oligocene, between 25 and 41 million years ago. The study's authors say their research supports the divergence of two main subfamilies of rhinos (Elasmotheriinae and Rhinocerotinae), and a bone analysis suggests a more recent split, roughly 22 to 34 million years ago. The unique environment of the Haughton Crater on Devon Island is promising for future studies on preserved proteins, said Fraser. The rhino fossil was collected decades ago by the late Mary Dawson, a vertebrate paleontologist from Philadelphia's Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Dawson collected it in 1986 at a time when protein extraction and ancient DNA technology "effectively didn't exist," according to Fraser. Fraser said in recent years, teams working on Devon Island or Ellesmere Island have worked with local community members like Jarloo Kiguktak of Grise Fiord, Nunavut. Kiguktak, an experienced fossil collector, said he joins the researchers on their search for specimens. The study's authors say they sequenced enamel proteins from the rhino fossil and more than 1,000 amino acid chains (peptides), which are the building blocks of proteins. They confirmed the proteins were ancient by matching the signs of age-related damage to expected burial conditions more than 20 million years ago in the Arctic environment, the researchers said. Dental enamel is the hardest material of vertebrates and it protects the proteins from breaking down over time, the research states. Fraser said while paleontology may sometimes be seen as "nerds studying their dinosaurs," these findings allow for reconstruction of molecular patterns. "We are nerds, and we love studying our fossils," she said. The fossil record is the "only record of the ancient world," and of animal species' long-term response to changes in climate, she said.
