JURASSIC BACTERIA

In an announcement right out of "Jurassic Park," scientists at California Polytechnic Institute say they'vereawakened a bacterial spore trapped in amber and preserved for 25 million years. Paul Cano, a microbiologist, and Monica Borucki, a graduate student in microbiology, announced that the microbe is alive and is producing a natural antibiotic that is being studied to determine if it has any medical value. Cano's work has not yet been replicated in another lab. TIME science reporter David Bjerklie says that while the research seems legitimate, it is too early to tell whether this is the real thing. "Nobody knows yet if it's possible for a bacteria to survive for 25 million years." Some scientists have suggested that the bacteria may be a more recent organism that adhered to the amber and was mistakenly thought to have been buried within it.