by Paul Wallis

Created on: January 22, 2007   Last Updated: May 04, 2007

The dinosaurs were the definitive survivors. They'd brushed off earlier extinction events, various planetary cataclysms, and were at the height of their diversity during the early Cretaceous period. They had characteristics of birds, mammals, and reptiles, and were easily the most efficient and adaptable animals ever. Their entire history was of filling niches and exploiting environments all over the world. They were usually prodigious breeders, and highly successful by any definition of the word.

So what wipes out the most diverse group of animals ever to exist prior to the mammals? It has to be something common to all members of the group. The one biological thing they all had in common was their egg laying cycle. (Ichthyosaurs were believed to breed live young, but this was probably more of an internal hatching methodology, dictated by the need for temperature to incubate eggs). An egg is a pernickety thing. To form an egg requires a supply of proteins, calcium, and to breed from eggs requires some work. Ask any crocodile.

The keyword is calcium. It happens that the end of the Cretaceous showed a decline in the diversity of dinosaurs, and some calcium deficient eggs. That's actually the worst sort of news for an egg laying species. Calcium deficiency isn't good for any living thing, but it's fatal for egg layers.

Calcium is an alkaline metal, one of the more abundant components of the biosphere, usually available in easily obtained amounts. It's used in muscle, nerves, brains, teeth, you name it, there's some calcium in it. The dinosaurs were adept users of calcium; you need to be pretty good with calcium to weigh several tons.

Meaning there's something more than weird about dinosaurs being calcium deficient. This is where the protein part of the equation comes in. Calcium and protein are codependent in all animals. The light metals are the basis of entire biological schematics in all organisms. It's not that easy to become calcium deficient. Egg layers in particular are not famous for it.

To wipe out the dinosaurs, therefore, and not wipe out everything else, means that they had to be suffering from something none of the other groups was afflicted by, and the affliction had to affect their entire life cycle.

Reproduction is based on the production of protein. To reproduce correctly, the appropriate proteins must be available, and to achieve that, the right enzymatic actions must occur. The dinosaurs, thanks to the reptile side of the family, were also pretty

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