Laura Sorkin clasped her hands in front of her and looked around at the assembled press. She didn't usually like talking to the press, but at the moment she was in her element. The press people had just returned from the park and they had the star struck, half dazed, expressions that usually followed someone's first encounter with a dinosaur. Now they were all gathered in the spotless lab in the Jurassic Park Genetics center. Technicians were scrambling around, looking busy, but Sorkin wasn't remotely worried, she had prepped for twenty years for this day.
"Ladies and Gentlemen" She said with a small smile, "I'm Laura Sorkin Vice President of Genetics for IGT. I think I am a correct in saying that at this moment you are feeling a little lost and confused, so let me see if I can clear things up for you. Our story begins…"
Dr. Sorkin crossed to a large display shelf and gestured to racks of amber with insects fossilized inside.
"Right here. The question we faced was; how do you find millions of years old dinosaur DNA? The theory, was that back in the dinosaur days there were mosquitos and other biting insects and that those insects would feed on the blood of dinosaurs. Supposedly, you could scrape the stomachs of those fossil insects and collect trace amounts of dinosaur DNA. Well, you can, and we did. However, one of the most fundamental problems we face is DNA degradation. DNA molecules breakdown fairly quickly and after five million years it's so degraded that it's practically useless."
One of the reporters raised a hand and Laura nodded to him generously.
"Uh… Dr. Sorkin? If the DNA degrades after five million years how can you clone animals that died 65 million years ago?"
"Oh very much older than that." Sorkin said with a smirk, "Some of our dinosaur species date from 199 million years ago. In addition to the DNA from fossilized insects, we discovered that trace amounts of DNA linger in the fossilized bones of dinosaurs and that by grinding down and analyzing these fragments we can get a more complete look at the molecule. However, even then, the most complete DNA molecule we have ever compiled is 12.6% of the full strand and that's nowhere NEAR enough to clone from, so how do we do it?"
Sorkin moved over to the large monitor screen behind her and flicked through images of the animals in Jurassic Park. She settled on an image of the Tyrannosaur. She stepped away from the monitor and the image of the rex started to rotate digitally.
"In order to clone the animals we have to fill the gene sequence gaps with cap DNA. We take the complete DNA of surviving animals and use it to fill in the necessary gaps in the genetic code. In general, we try to pick animals that are either descended from the dinosaurs we want to clone, or that fill a similar ecological niche. Mona Lisa, our Tyrannosaur, is made up with DNA from marabou storks, condors, golden eagles and salt water crocodiles. We breed the animals to be as close to what we know they were like from the fossil record as possible and bingo."
Desiree frowned and raised her hand in question.
"So what you're saying is that these animals aren't really dinosaurs, they're just modified birds and stuff?" She asked, her pencil poised over her notebook.
"That's quite correct." Sorkin said with a slight nod, "None of the animals we have here in Jurassic Park are true dinosaurs. They look like dinosaurs, move like dinosaurs, but they are entirely not dinosaurs. In reality these are genetic chimeras and nothing more."
Sorkin smiled and chuckled a little.
"But try explaining that to the fourth graders." She said with a grin, "And really, that's who all this is for. Kids love dinosaurs and you can tell them that all birds are really dinosaurs until you're blue in the face but they'll never believe you."
Sorkin lead the group through the lab to several animal cages, one of which held a large parrot. She feed the parrot a biscuit and scratched it on the top its head. The parrot nipped playfully at one her fingers and then scrambled onto her outstretched hand.
"This is George. He is by far the most legitimate dinosaur on the whole island, but as I said, you show him to the fourth graders and they'll say 'no it's a parrot'. See, people have an idea in their heads about dinosaurs. They think they're big and scary, covered in leathery hide with dragging tails and tiny brains. But the fact is that none of that is true. What we are trying to do here at Jurassic Park is to change 100 years of entrenched dogma about dinosaurs. The goal is to get the fourth graders to alter their ideas about dinosaurs, if we can do that, we can change everyone's ideas."
"So are all the dinosaurs on the island chimeras?" one of the reporters asked.
"Yes they are." Sorkin said, "Though some more so than others."
Sorkin clicked another button of the console and an image of a velociraptor appeared on the screen. The adult had beautiful blue-green iridescent feathers covering its body. It looked like a bird and for a moment no one said anything.
"Our velociraptors are the most true to original that we have in Jurassic Park. Small predatory dinosaurs like velociraptor were some of the very last dinosaurs to die out. Everyone thinks that the dinosaurs all blinked out at once. The meteor came down and… poof! But the truth is that they struggled on for nearly a million years after the impact. Most of the big ones like Tyrannosaurus couldn't handle the climate changes and went down but the little dromaeosaurs like the raptors held on right to the end. The DNA samples that we received from raptor specimens were the most complete we found. For our velociraptors we combined DNA from Velociraptor mongoliensis and Velociraptor osmolskae, but even then we only got 12.6% full strand. However, we also mixed in some Deinonychus DNA, a larger but contemporary species of raptor from North America and knocked the total up to 30.7% full strand. The result is that our raptors, while not being any true raptor species, are at least more true-dinosaur than any other species in Jurassic Park. That's not to say they aren't capped though, we used DNA from secretary birds, cassowaries and hawks to fill in the gaps."
"Do you know what caps were used on every animal?" One of the reporters asked and Sorkin nodded.
"Yes, we have done very serious research into every one of the genetic donors. We use exclusively reptilian, avian and mammalian DNA."
"Mammalian? You mean you cross breed with mammals?" Desiree asked looking surprised.
"Only in the case of some of our larger herbivores." Sorkin said, pulling up an image of a Stegosaurus. "Some of the larger species we couldn't find any reptiles or birds that fill the same ecological niche. For our stegosaurs for example, we used frilled lizard for heat control and ground parrot for beak and digestion, but a decent portion of the DNA came from a horse. The trick is that all birds are dinosaurs, but not all dinosaurs were birds. We needed a large, warm blooded, grass feeding animal for the stegos and horses fit the bill very well. It's not as bizarre as it sounds though, don't forget that mammals evolved from reptiles the same as birds did, so a lot of mammalian base DNA is the same as a reptile's. We used elephant and giraffe DNA for the apatosaurs and brachiosaurs as well, mostly to help with blood circulation and bone density."
"What about the animals that breed in the wild?" one of the reporters asked, "how do you monitor their genetics?"
Sorkin paused and looked firmly at the questioner.
"The animals CAN'T breed in the wild or anywhere else. Population control is one of our chief concerns. Every animal in Jurassic Park is female, which isn't difficult to regulate as all vertebrate embryos are inherently female anyway they just need a Y chromosome at the correct stage of development to make them male, we just deny them that. Not only that, but we are extremely careful that none of the donor species can change sex under any circumstance. You might know that some west African frogs can change sex from female to male in a single sex environment, however, such behavior has not been observed in any reptile or bird species that we use for our donors. There have also been cases of reptiles, lizards especially, reproducing asexually, however we do not use DNA from such species and use the reproductive genes of bird donors for the sexual development. The final security check comes from the nature of the animals themselves. Genetic hybrids generally are not fertile. A horse and a mule can cross breed to make a jack ass, but said jack ass cannot reproduce or if it can, it can only reproduce with a member of one of its parent species; a horse or a mule, not another jack ass. In such cases, cross species breeding is possible only in cases where the genes are similar enough between the two species to allow for fertilization. However, with the animals in Jurassic Park, we are combining WIDELY divergent species; it would be like trying to get a horse to breed with a cow. Just because they both have hooves doesn't mean they are closely related. Our animals are unique genetic hybrids, made of the DNA of several animal species. They cannot breed. We also sterilize every animal in Jurassic Park both chemically and physically and every dinosaur has a hysterectomy procedure done on her at birth. Breeding is not only a major environmental concern, but is also a major health concern for our animals. Egg production takes a lot of work and resources on the part of the mother and can be very detrimental to the animal's health. Since these animals represent many thousands of man hours in work and research, as well as a significant cost, we take every precaution to keep them healthy and happy."
"So you breed all the dinosaurs here?" Desiree asked
Sorkin shook her head and clicked the monitor off.
"No, yields of genetically created organisms are very low on the order of 1.4% or less. We just can't do the full scale production necessary at this facility. We breed the animals on our Site B facility on Isla Sorna eighty-seven miles from here. We raise the animals to the point that it is safe to move them and then move them over here to our nursery you'll see in a moment. We own three islands in the area; Isla Nublar where we have all the major guest services and the park itself, Isla Sorna where we have the Site B research lab and development facility and Isla Montenceros, which is where we have our farming facility where we grow all the crops and livestock necessary for feeding the animals in the park. Dinosaurs need a lot of food, so we are working on farming livestock and crops nearly constantly, so much so that we've even had to modify the genetic them to make them grow faster. Now, if there aren't any further questions, I believe we have a lunch planned for you at Le Gigante our five star restaurant."