As the chief veterinarian at game parks in western North America,
Africa, and Australia, you oversaw the care and feeding of reptiles, including
the Komodo "dragon," as well as large herds of mammals in nature preserves
in Kenya. The chance to manage the first group of cloned dinosaurs is
a job too exciting to pass up. You plan to tell the judges that years
of experience in animal husbandry in wild and domesticated stock lead
you to believe that the management of dinosaurs is not an insurmountable
problem. You'll note that during the Mesozoic, dinosaurs had co-evolved
with a diversity of plants, including early angiosperms. Dinosaurs demonstrated
over millions of years a considerable adaptability to new food sources
throughout the Mesozoic. As ecologic generalists, you predict that they
will adjust well to the wide assortment of grains and grasses that modern
mammals depend on to fuel their active lives. You've already been involved
in an experimental program in Tanzania where vaccinations of lions and
cheetahs successfully boosted their immune systems and prevented the further
spread of deadly viruses, which have culled many populations of African
felids. Similar techniques could be applied to dinosaurs so that their
Mesozoic immune systems would be able to tolerate Cenozoic diseases. Daily
maintenance and care of dinosaurs would ensure their survival under carefully
monitored conditions by well-trained staff. Furthermore, as a pathologist
interested in the origins of diseases that still plague humankind, you
see a real benefit in being able to investigate the factors associated
with arthritis and syphilis, diseases that also affected dinosaurs. Finally,
you will urge the judges to allow dinosaur cloning by pointing out that
cloned dinosaurs could also benefit humans by serving as a source for
bone grafts and possibly even organ and tissue transplants.
|
