A team of paleontologists used CT scans and tissue samples to uncover blood pathogens in an infected titanosaur

It was 2018, and Aureliano was examining the fossilized leg bone of a small dinosaur from the titanosaur family discovered by Ghilardi 12 years earlier. An expert in fossilized dinosaur tissue, Aureliano had been tasked with looking more closely at the spongey lumps on the bone’s surface.

The pair of paleontologists had already made a fascinating discovery—that the dinosaur, which lived more than 80 million years ago during the Cretaceous period, had an acute bone infection called osteomyelitis. But Aureliano prepared thin slices of the fossilized bone to allow for a more detailed study of the infection, which still affects animals and humans today.

What he found when he looked through his microscope were microfossils, fossilized microorganisms generally less than a millimeter in size. Although microfossils can be plants or animals, this time they were parasites.

Reconstruction of a titanosaur with ulcerations

A fossilized parasite preserved inside a sauropod vascular canal

Both the dinosaur—a small, long-necked titanosaur sauropod about sixteen feet from nose to tail—and the 70 blood parasites found within the vascular channels of its bone are newly discovered species that have yet to be named or described.

With the image, the researchers were able to diagnose the mystery lesions not as cancer, but as osteomyelitis. They could also see that the infection extended from deep within the bone all the way to its surface, likely causing the elderly dinosaur a lot of pain and creating inflammation on its bones and open sores on its skin

The infection is most commonly caused by severe trauma where both the bone and the skin break, allowing bacteria to enter the bone more easily. Osteomyelitis is a frequent concern during orthopedic surgery on humans.

Nascimento was able to identify dozens more, over 70 in total, of the preserved microorganisms, which ended up being blood parasites. Before that moment, fossilized parasites had only ever been found in amber or fossilized feces.

But one thing the team has yet to figure out is whether the parasites caused the osteomyelitis, or whether the infection created an ideal environment that allowed the parasites to take advantage of the dinosaur, enter its bones and thrive. With no signs of a break or a bite in the bone, the researchers have been left stumped as to how the infection started.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/first-evidence-parasites-dinosaur-bones-found-180976309/

Amazing, just amazing.

The blood parasites that affect humans are either bacteria (eg staph) or single celled eukaryotes (sleeping sickness, malaria). I wonder whether there is any prospect of identifying these dinosaur parasites.

PermeateFree said:

A team of paleontologists used CT scans and tissue samples to uncover blood pathogens in an infected titanosaur

It was 2018, and Aureliano was examining the fossilized leg bone of a small dinosaur from the titanosaur family discovered by Ghilardi 12 years earlier. An expert in fossilized dinosaur tissue, Aureliano had been tasked with looking more closely at the spongey lumps on the bone’s surface.

The pair of paleontologists had already made a fascinating discovery—that the dinosaur, which lived more than 80 million years ago during the Cretaceous period, had an acute bone infection called osteomyelitis. But Aureliano prepared thin slices of the fossilized bone to allow for a more detailed study of the infection, which still affects animals and humans today.

What he found when he looked through his microscope were microfossils, fossilized microorganisms generally less than a millimeter in size. Although microfossils can be plants or animals, this time they were parasites.

Reconstruction of a titanosaur with ulcerations

A fossilized parasite preserved inside a sauropod vascular canal

Both the dinosaur—a small, long-necked titanosaur sauropod about sixteen feet from nose to tail—and the 70 blood parasites found within the vascular channels of its bone are newly discovered species that have yet to be named or described.

With the image, the researchers were able to diagnose the mystery lesions not as cancer, but as osteomyelitis. They could also see that the infection extended from deep within the bone all the way to its surface, likely causing the elderly dinosaur a lot of pain and creating inflammation on its bones and open sores on its skin

The infection is most commonly caused by severe trauma where both the bone and the skin break, allowing bacteria to enter the bone more easily. Osteomyelitis is a frequent concern during orthopedic surgery on humans.

Nascimento was able to identify dozens more, over 70 in total, of the preserved microorganisms, which ended up being blood parasites. Before that moment, fossilized parasites had only ever been found in amber or fossilized feces.

But one thing the team has yet to figure out is whether the parasites caused the osteomyelitis, or whether the infection created an ideal environment that allowed the parasites to take advantage of the dinosaur, enter its bones and thrive. With no signs of a break or a bite in the bone, the researchers have been left stumped as to how the infection started.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/first-evidence-parasites-dinosaur-bones-found-180976309/

“Osteomyelitis is one of the oldest diseases ever recorded. Evidence of the disease has been found in the fractured spine of a Permian reptile, close to 250 million years ago.”

Technical article available for free from ResearchGate.

“Paleoparasitology
“Abundant dark grey to slightly green fusiform shapes (n=64), measuring between 100 and 650 μm in length, and 10-80 μm in width, were observed inside cortical vascular canals and medullary spongiosa.”

Reminds me a bit of the sleeping sickness parasite, trypanosome. But trypanosomes are much smaller, only 16-42 µm in length by 1-3 µm in width. Flukes on the other hand are much bigger. This dinosaur parasite has a size that seems too large for a single celled parasite and too small for a multi-celled parasite. A puzzle.

Maybe it got bitten by something and the parasites entered that way?

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

A team of paleontologists used CT scans and tissue samples to uncover blood pathogens in an infected titanosaur

It was 2018, and Aureliano was examining the fossilized leg bone of a small dinosaur from the titanosaur family discovered by Ghilardi 12 years earlier. An expert in fossilized dinosaur tissue, Aureliano had been tasked with looking more closely at the spongey lumps on the bone’s surface.

The pair of paleontologists had already made a fascinating discovery—that the dinosaur, which lived more than 80 million years ago during the Cretaceous period, had an acute bone infection called osteomyelitis. But Aureliano prepared thin slices of the fossilized bone to allow for a more detailed study of the infection, which still affects animals and humans today.

What he found when he looked through his microscope were microfossils, fossilized microorganisms generally less than a millimeter in size. Although microfossils can be plants or animals, this time they were parasites.

Reconstruction of a titanosaur with ulcerations

A fossilized parasite preserved inside a sauropod vascular canal

Both the dinosaur—a small, long-necked titanosaur sauropod about sixteen feet from nose to tail—and the 70 blood parasites found within the vascular channels of its bone are newly discovered species that have yet to be named or described.

With the image, the researchers were able to diagnose the mystery lesions not as cancer, but as osteomyelitis. They could also see that the infection extended from deep within the bone all the way to its surface, likely causing the elderly dinosaur a lot of pain and creating inflammation on its bones and open sores on its skin

The infection is most commonly caused by severe trauma where both the bone and the skin break, allowing bacteria to enter the bone more easily. Osteomyelitis is a frequent concern during orthopedic surgery on humans.

Nascimento was able to identify dozens more, over 70 in total, of the preserved microorganisms, which ended up being blood parasites. Before that moment, fossilized parasites had only ever been found in amber or fossilized feces.

But one thing the team has yet to figure out is whether the parasites caused the osteomyelitis, or whether the infection created an ideal environment that allowed the parasites to take advantage of the dinosaur, enter its bones and thrive. With no signs of a break or a bite in the bone, the researchers have been left stumped as to how the infection started.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/first-evidence-parasites-dinosaur-bones-found-180976309/

“Osteomyelitis is one of the oldest diseases ever recorded. Evidence of the disease has been found in the fractured spine of a Permian reptile, close to 250 million years ago.”

Technical article available for free from ResearchGate.

“Paleoparasitology
“Abundant dark grey to slightly green fusiform shapes (n=64), measuring between 100 and 650 μm in length, and 10-80 μm in width, were observed inside cortical vascular canals and medullary spongiosa.”

Reminds me a bit of the sleeping sickness parasite, trypanosome. But trypanosomes are much smaller, only 16-42 µm in length by 1-3 µm in width. Flukes on the other hand are much bigger. This dinosaur parasite has a size that seems too large for a single celled parasite and too small for a multi-celled parasite. A puzzle.

>>Osteomyelitis is one of the oldest diseases ever recorded. Evidence of the disease has been found in the fractured spine of a Permian reptile, close to 250 million years ago<<

This is evidence of Osteomyelitis, NOT the actual parasite as per the OP.

>>“Abundant dark grey to slightly green fusiform shapes (n=64), measuring between 100 and 650 μm in length, and 10-80 μm in width, were observed inside cortical vascular canals and medullary spongiosa.”<<

This relates to the fossilised parasite, the subject of this article and NOT the 250 million year old fossil showing the evidence of Osteomyelitis.