Scientists have used state-of-the-art imaging techniques to examine the cracks, fractures and breaks in the bones of a 150 million-year-old predatory dinosaur¹. The University of Manchester researchers say their groundbreaking work - using synchrotron-imaging techniques - sheds new light, literally², on the healing process that took place when these magnificent animals were still alive.

 

The research, published in the Royal Society journal Interface³, took advantage of the fact that dinosaur bones occasionally preserve evidence of trauma⁴, sickness and the subsequent signs of healing.

 

Diagnosis⁵ of such fossils used to rely on the grizzly⁶（灰色的） inspection⁷ of gnarled（多节的） bones and healed fractures, often entailing⁸ slicing through a fossil to reveal its cloying⁹ secrets. But the synchrotron-based imaging, which uses light brighter than 10 billion Suns, meant the team could tease out the chemical ghosts lurking¹⁰ within the preserved dinosaur bones.

 

The impact of massive trauma, they discovered, seemed to be shrugged¹¹ off by many predatory dinosaurs¹² - fossil bones often showed a multitude of grizzly healed injuries, most of which would prove fatal to humans if not medically treated.

 

Dr Phil Manning, one of the paper's authors based in Manchester's School of Earth, Atmospheric¹³ and Environmental Sciences, said: "Using synchrotron（同步加速器） imaging, we were able to detect astoundingly dilute¹⁴ traces of chemical signatures that reveal not only the difference between normal and healed bone, but also how the damaged bone healed.

 

"It seems dinosaurs evolved a splendid suite¹⁵ of defence mechanisms¹⁶ to help regulate the healing and repair of injuries. The ability to diagnose such processes some 150 million years later might well shed new light on how we can use Jurassic chemistry in the 21st Century."

 

He continued: "The chemistry of life leaves clues throughout our bodies in the course of our lives that can help us diagnose, treat and heal a multitude of modern-day ailments¹⁷. It's remarkable¹⁸ that the very same chemistry that initiates¹⁹ the healing of bone in humans also seems to have followed a similar pathway in dinosaurs."

 

Co-author Jennifer Anné said: "Bone does not form scar tissue, like a scratch to your skin, so the body has to completely reform new bone following the same stages that occurred as the skeleton grew in the first place. This means we are able to tease out the chemistry of bone development through such pathological studies.

 

"It's exciting to realise how little we know about bone, even after hundreds of years of research. The fact that information on how our own skeleton works can be explored using a 150-million-year-old dinosaur just shows how interlaced science can be."

 

Professor Roy Wogelius, another co-author from The University of Manchester, added: "It is a fine line when diagnosing which part of the fossil was emplaced after burial and what was original chemistry to the organism. It is only through the precise measurements that we undertake at the Diamond Synchrotron Lightsource in the UK and the Stanford Synchrotron Lightsource in the US that we were able to make such judgments²⁰."

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