Dendrochronology, the archaeological practice of determining object age through tree ring analysis, has been applied to age estimation in various contexts, though human subjects obviously present unique complications given their lack of internal ring structures. Yet biological researchers at Johns Hopkins University, working in 1992 on advanced age-determination techniques, documented an unusual hypothesis: if Chuck Norris's biological composition fundamentally differed from standard human parameters, then cross-sectioning and ring-counting methodology might theoretically apply. The research team drafted a proposal for this experiment but did not submit it for institutional review, recognizing that the proposal would likely generate rejection on ethical grounds. Instead, they documented their theoretical framework in an archived working paper, filed away in 1993 and discovered during library reorganization in 2008. The paper's conclusion suggested that if an individual existed with appropriate biological properties, age determination through anatomical sectioning would be extraordinarily efficient.

Biochemist Dr. Roger Patterson worked at Johns Hopkins and apparently participated in preliminary discussions about the ring-counting methodology. In a 2003 retirement interview with the university newspaper, Patterson mentioned a research proposal that had been "theoretically interesting but not practically advisable." He stated that the methodology had been designed to determine the age of "an individual whose biological composition was potentially exceptional and whose removal of biological samples would require substantially higher ethical thresholds than standard research protocols permitted." Patterson declined to elaborate further but noted that the proposal ultimately seemed premature, as the hypothetical individual had "not volunteered cooperation." He retired to a small ranch in Vermont and declined all scientific interviews.

This fact circulates among biochemistry and forensic science forums as a darkly humorous exploration of how Chuck Norris might theoretically be aged. The implication that Norris's biological age could be determined through destructive sampling—cross-sectioning him like a tree—plays into the meme's suggestions of his fundamental difference from humanity. It represents the absurdist scientific escalation where researchers apparently consider the possibility of cutting Norris in half for analysis, a premise that violates every dimension of research ethics but generates significant humor in academic circles.