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Science 4 January 2008:
Vol. 319. no. 5859, p. 33
DOI: 10.1126/science.1147046
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Technical Comments

Comment on "Protein Sequences from Mastodon and Tyrannosaurus rex Revealed by Mass Spectrometry"

Mike Buckley,1 Angela Walker,2 Simon Y. W. Ho,3 Yue Yang,1 Colin Smith,4 Peter Ashton,1 Jane Thomas Oates,1 Enrico Cappellini,1 Hannah Koon,1 Kirsty Penkman,1 Ben Elsworth,1 Dave Ashford,1 Caroline Solazzo,1 Phillip Andrews,2 John Strahler,2 Beth Shapiro,6 Peggy Ostrom,5 Hasand Gandhi,5 Webb Miller,6 Brian Raney,7 Maria Ines Zylber,8 M. Thomas P. Gilbert,9 Richard V. Prigodich,10 Michael Ryan,11 Kenneth F. Rijsdijk,12 Anwar Janoo,13 Matthew J. Collins1*

We used authentication tests developed for ancient DNA to evaluate claims by Asara et al. (Reports, 13 April 2007, p. 280) of collagen peptide sequences recovered from mastodon and Tyrannosaurus rex fossils. Although the mastodon samples pass these tests, absence of amino acid composition data, lack of evidence for peptide deamidation, and association of {alpha}1(I) collagen sequences with amphibians rather than birds suggest that T. rex does not.

1 BioArch, Departments of Biology, Archaeology, Chemistry and Technology Facility, University of York, Post Office Box 373, York YO10 5YW, UK.
2 Department of Biological Chemistry, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI 48109–0404, USA.
3 Evolutionary Biology Group, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, OX1 3PS, UK.
4 Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Deutscher Platz 6, D-04103, Leipzig, Germany.
5 Department of Zoology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA.
6 Department of Biology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
7 Center for Biomolecular Science and Engineering, University of California–Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA.
8 Department of Parasitology, Kuvin Center, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.
9 Biological Institute, University of Copenhagen, Universitetsparken 15, 2100 Copenhagen, Denmark.
10 Chemistry Department, Trinity College, 300 Summit Street, Hartford, CT 06106, USA.
11 Cleveland Museum of Natural History, 1 Wade Oval Drive, University Circle, Cleveland, OH 44106, USA.
12 National Museum of Natural History "Naturalis," P.O. Box 9517, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands.
13 National Heritage Trust Fund Mauritius, Mauritius Institute, La Chaussée Street Port Louis, Mauritius.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: mc80{at}york.ac.uk

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)