HUMAN INTEREST What came first, the chicken or the egg? The answer is the chicken, scientists finally solving the world's ultimate scientific mystery. Researchers found that the formation of egg shells relies on a protein found only in a chicken's ovaries.
An egg can exist only if it has been inside a chicken. A protein called ovocledidin-17 (OC-17) acts as a catalyst to speed up the development of the shell. This hard shell is essential to house the yolk and its protective fluids while the chick develops inside.
According to scientists from Sheffield and Warwick universities used a super computer to 'zoom in' on the formation of an egg. The computer, called HECToR and based in Edinburgh, revealed that OC-17 is crucial in kick-starting crystallisation - the early stages of the creation of a shell.
The protein coverts calcium carbonate into calcite crystals which make up the shell. Calcite crystals are found in numerous bones and shells but chickens form them quicker than any other species - creating six grams (0.2oz) of shell every 24 hours.
"It had long been suspected that the egg came first but now we have the scientific proof that shows that in fact the chicken came first. The protein had been identified before and it was linked to egg formation but by examining it closely we have been able to see how it controls the process.
It's very interesting to find that different types of avian species seem to have a variation of the protein that does the same job," the report quotes Dr Colin Freeman from Sheffield University's Department of Engineering Materials as saying.
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