SCIENTISTS have gained their best idea yet of the genetic code of dinosaurs after drawing up the first complete genome for a chicken — thought to be one of their direct descendants.

The results of a four-year, £10m-plus project to crack the genetic code of chickens will be released this week, along with a full analysis of their evolution and ancestry.

It will strengthen evidence obtained from fossils that birds are the direct descendants of dinosaurs.

Blair Hedges, an evolutionary biologist at Pennsylvania State University said: “It seems clear that birds, like reptiles, go way back, all the way to the dinosaurs.

“The chicken is the first bird or reptile to have its genes sequenced but it is part of a huge group of animals that includes snakes, lizards and crocs, and the dinosaurs. The chicken genome is a unique insight into the ancient history of life on the planet.”

The papers will also reveal that although chickens might seem primitive they have roughly the same number of genes as humans — and far less of the junk DNA that fills the human genome and which can contribute to harmful mutations.

They will also suggest that humans and chickens have a common ancestor, a small reptilian creature that walked the earth — or maybe crawled — around 300m years ago. It would have predated both the dinosaurs and the earliest mammals.

Angela Milner, assistant keeper of palaeontology at the Natural History Museum in London, said that the animal gave rise to the mammal-like reptiles — a line that evolved into mammals, and also to the archosaurs, which produced birds, crocodiles and dinosaurs.

The first bird, archaeopteryx, is thought to have evolved about 147m years ago. Milner said: “The real ancestors of today’s chickens appeared later, probably around 50m years ago.”

However, the chicken genome was also commissioned for practical reasons. “Knowing how their genomes work will lead to many practical applications in medicine and agriculture,” said a researcher for the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) who worked on breaking the code.

It could also save the lives of laboratory mice because chicken eggs and embryos share many genes and biochemical pathways with mammals, so they can be substituted for live animals in experiments.

“The BBSRC put millions of pounds into this project largely because of the animal welfare benefits and it is already paying off,” said the co-author of some of the research to be published this week in the journal, Nature.

Now the genome is known, scientists hope to accelerate the rate of evolution creating a range of genetically modified birds.

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