A recent study shows that the protein derived from the bones of a 68 million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex is strongly similar to the main protein found in chicken and ostrich bones and is only vaguely related to lizards'.  This bolsters the popular theory that it is birds and not reptiles that are the closest living relatives of the dinosaurs. This happens to be the latest snippet on the Tyrannosaurus rex, build up on a 2007 analysis indicating remarkable similarities between T. rex collagen and collagen from modern-day chickens. Collagen is the primary protein in bones.

 

This study, however, does not comprise association with other living species. John M. Asara of Harvard Medical School has led the studies. He says that the researchers will now be able to come up with more confident evolutionary relationships and group the T. Rex Dinosaur with birds. Asara’s group states that

their latest finding has the power to redesign the evolutionary tree on the basis of molecular data, instead of the traditional comparisons of skeletal remains.

 

The main feature of the new finding, which is also the cause of some controversy, is Asara team's claim that it got a dash of intact collagen from the fossilized thigh bone of a T. rex. Biological things normally degrade with time and scientists, who work with ancient DNA, feel fortunate upon discovering a sample that is 100,000 years old. The T. rex protein specimen, on the other hand, is over 100 times older than that causing few to wonder if it might be a more recent contaminant.