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Last Updated: Thursday, 29 September 2005, 08:37 GMT 09:37 UK
Dinosaur eggs fail to reveal life
The fossilised hadrosaur eggs
The eggs came from a clutch found in the mongolian desert
A medical scan of three fossilised dinosaur eggs by experts hoping to find life in them has proved inconclusive.

The eggs were brought to England from China before exports of the rare specimens were banned.

They are encased in one piece of rock and are normally on display at a gem shop in Tunbridge Wells, Kent.

Owner Graham Bell said images from the scan appeared to show parts of the shell, but the Natural History Museum would be investigating further.

The fossilised hadrosaur eggs are scanned
The eggs were put through a scanner normally used by people

It had been hoped that the hadrosaur eggs, which are at least 70 million years old, would yield a glimpse of a dinosaur embryo.

The eggs came from a clutch found in a nesting site in the mongolian desert.

They were spotted in the shop by someone from a local medical centre who offered Mr Bell the chance of putting them through a state-of-the-art scanner usually used for checking out people's heart disease.

Mr Bell said: "As the images emerged so more things became visible and we saw what we first thought were bones... but we think they were probably parts of the shell that had collapsed into the egg before petrification."

He added that the eggs would eventually be sold, which had been always been his original intention.



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