DEEP TIME
Dinosaur Bones From Brazil May Hold Traces of Blood, Researchers Report
A Curtin University-led team says chemical signatures linked to hemoglobin survived 115 million years, though outside experts dispute part of the claim.
PERTH, AUSTRALIA — Scientists examining the fossilized limb bones of a carnivorous dinosaur report they have found what may be mineralized remnants of red blood cells, along with chemical evidence associated with hemoglobin. According to Unknown Country, an international team led by Australia's Curtin University announced the findings on Nov. 3, 2026.
The research, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, concerns Aratasaurus museunacionali, discovered in northeastern Brazil. The bones were recovered from a mine in 2008. The team used electron microscopy and mass spectrometry, and says it found structures resembling red blood cells inside the vascular canals, the narrow channels that once carried blood through the bone. Analyses also detected heme-associated molecules and amino acids linked to collagen.
The researchers believe the animal was buried quickly in a low-oxygen setting rich in microorganisms. Mineralization involving hausmannite, a manganese oxide, may have helped steady these microscopic features across the millennia. Curtin geochemist Kliti Grice, who led the study, called the work a major advance in understanding how ancient biological material survives fossilization.
Not all observers are persuaded. Paleontologist Mary Schweitzer of North Carolina State University told ABC Australia she doubted the structures could be firmly identified as red blood cells, though she found the heme and collagen evidence credible. Physicist Mauricio Barbi of the University of Regina likewise cautioned that the identification requires interpretation. The report stresses that no liquid blood, living cells or intact DNA were recovered, and that tests for ancient DNA came back negative.
The study also looks skyward. Curtin planetary scientist Martin Van Kranendonk suggested the results could bear on the hunt for ancient life beyond Earth. The report adds that the study does not establish comparable preservation on Mars, whose conditions and geological history differ substantially from those of Earth.