Scientists find fossilised blood cells inside a 115-million-year-old dinosaur's leg bone from Brazil — but NO DNA

A Curtin University team led by Professor Kliti Grice has chemically confirmed the presence of haemoglobin-derived heme molecules inside mineralised, ellipsoidal structures found within vascular canals of the Aratasaurus museunacionali's leg bone — the first time such evidence has been found inside a fossil blood cell anywhere in the world. The dinosaur, a small meat-eating theropod weighing around 34kg, died on coastal microbial mats in what is now northeastern Brazil; swift burial in anoxic conditions helped preserve the delicate structures. The findings are published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Ancient DNA tests came up negative, ruling out any prospect of cloning — 'the chances of finding DNA from extinct dinosaurs are really very small,' said Professor Darren Griffin of the University of Kent.

The dinosaur's remains were recovered from a Brazilian mine in 2008, and the researchers who forwarded the bones to Grice had 'no idea there was going to be blood cells or heme inside.'

Hausmannite, a mineral present at the site, sealed and shielded the biological structures like a natural time capsule, while coastal microbes on which the animal died may also have aided preservation.