Can you get the DNA of a dinosaur, by tracing it back through the DNA of modern species?

Question

In other words, DNA, supposedly (my beleifs, but the reason I am asking is due to my ignorance), is like a history book that you can look into the past, so could you not obtain dinosaur DNA, through tracing back through the DNA of modern species?

2nd answerer:

I see what your saying---that you cannot really trace it because the modern specie is a mutation of some previous DNA, and that is a mutation of another, etc, etc, to the point that the modern DNA is unrecognizable from the old one because it has mutated so much...

Welll...new question...

Is it possible to pinpoint where a current specie, mutated from the specie it originated from (which is now extinct say)...

then you could bring back the immediet specie beforehand, and repeat the process until you get to the dinosaurs?

In other words, you just go back a little bit (1 or 2 mutations) which could be pinpointed (by some technology) and then reversed...and then pinpoint, etc, etc

reverse engineering evolution?

I also read somewhere that cells have all this "unknown DNA" surrounding the real one used for replication and instructional processes within cells

maybe that DNA is the "byproduct" of so much mutation, that it is the inherent blueprints of old DNA dating back to the unicellular organism that gave birth to life on Earth....

whatever---I did read that it was very difficult to make much sense of this "other" DNA, so maybe its a lost cause, until we have more sophisticated simulation technology, such as human-machine interfaces, probabilistic engines and quantum computers...

but its worth the dreaming for now I guess.

Answer 1

Not yet.

Answer 2

If you just compare all the organisms in a group, you can make some decent guesses about the relationships between them, but today's biology usually doesn't allow you to compare the whole genome except for two organisms that have been sequenced (like chimp and humans, for example). For others, like mammoths for example, you'd be making guesses based on a limited sample of the DNA that was compared. Also, there's new information suggesting that there's a second genetic code specifying how genes are packaged, and we don't know how to look for problems in that code yet, so trying to make an extinct organism has lots of hurdles to clear yet, Michael Crighton to the contrary notwithstanding.

Answer 3

It is impossible to trace back to previous creatures through the DNA, you can trace to related species if you have samples of their DNA, however at present our knowledge of genetics is insufficiently advanced to do what you suggest. In time it may be possible to determine an approximate genetic sequence for extinct species using a technique similar to your suggestion, however that technology is still a long way in the future.

Answer 4

What you say in theory is somehow right but ,these new and modern species` DNA and Genome are result of mutations in old Genome,and as you know there is no rule and grammar for mutations.imagine a bacteria has 3000 genes and each gene contains 1000 nucleotides,and and any substituation of each nucleotide makes a mutation so 3 million kinds mutation could happen.So this stimulation of genes doesn`t work but now we can find genes through fossils and bones core and stimulate it.the usage of tracing genes in different species and generations is in Evolution Science.

Answer 5

What did you delete your last question? No we cannot recreate the dinosaur by tracing back through the DNA of modern species.