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<<Date: Wed, 11 Aug 1999 09:08:24 -0400 From: "Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <tholtz@geol.umd.edu> To: <dinosaur@usc.edu> Subject: New paper: Shuvuuia's feathers Message-ID: <NDBBIAJHGJBHMGNKDFAHIEBGCAAA.tholtz@geol.umd.edu">NDBBIAJHGJBHMGNKDFAHIEBGCAAA.tholtz@geol.umd.edu> Hi, everybody. A new paper that might interest some people (and might well escape notice, as the journal in question is not one frequently associated with paleontology) : Schweitzer, M.H., J.A. Watt, R. Avci, L. Knapp, L. Chiappe, M. Norell & M. Marshall. 1999. Beta-keratin specific immunological reactivity in feather-like structures of the Cretaceous alvarezsaurid, _Shuvuuia deserti_. Journal of Experimental Zoology (Mol Dev Evol) 285: 146-157. A LOOONNGG awaited paper, describing Mary Schweitzer et al.'s analysis of the feathers found on the type of _Shuvuuia_. All that are preserved are hollow shafts around the specimen (sorry: now well preserved plumage). Most of the paper concentrates on the team's biochemical analyses, which show that the elements (as preserved) represent the decay products of the protein beta keratin (only produced in the epidermal cells of Reptilia (including Aves) among living tetrapods). Futhermore, there is no evidence for the decay products of alpha keratin: feathers alone among modern vertebrate epidermal structures are composed only of beta keratin.>> Hello Dr Holtz! Do you,...(or does anybody on the list) know
if such an analysis has been done on the "integuementary fibres" of Sordes
pilosus??? Also,...hasn`t Unwin tried to show that these fibres are not
featherlike in nature?....(I would know this one if I had a copy of his book
"Biology of Pterosaurs",...but alas, have not yet recieved a copy.....ps,...does
this book even exist or is it just a rumor????)
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