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The news that scientists have created hybrid white rhinoceros embryos has given new hope to those who feared that the white rhinoceros would be dedicated to # 39; extinction. bring back other long-gone species – and if so, should they?
The work to save the Northern White Rhinoceros uses IVF technology, but this method will probably not work on an animal that has been missing for thousands of years.
Swedish science journalist Torill Kornfeldt has traveled the world in search of the science of "de-excitation" for his book "The Re-origin of Species"
She says Jurassic Park has shown what the process is supposed to look like: trapped in amber, they draw dinosaur blood from the perfectly preserved specimen, then use this DNA to clone the extinct reptile.
Except that researchers have tried this and it does not work.
"They do not find a dinosaur They also do not find mosquito DNA," explains Kornfeldt, explaining that even well-preserved DNA is degraded over time.
A gigantic task
So the dinosaurs are probably out (as are the mosquitoes of the Jurassic era) But what about something that has gone out a little more recently, like the woolly mammoth?
" The wooly mammoth is difficult, "says Kornfeldt, predicting that we could see a living mammoth" either 15 years old or never ".]" This research still depends on some scientific breakthroughs that have not yet occurred – but that could To be still. "
Even if these breakthroughs occur, the creature created by scientists will not be a cloned mammoth.
Cloning is only possible when there are tissue samples from a live animal, or "very recently dead".
Woolly mammoths have disappeared for thousands of years.
Scientists can reconstruct this DNA in a computer by comparing it to a living parent, such as the Asian Elephant
"Kind of like looking at the lid when Kornfeldt says," You do not You do not have full chromosomes in a vial, but you have a digital file. "
The next step is to identify the genetic differences between the elephant and the mammoth – the genes that govern the fur of the animal, for example – then to modify the genes of the animal. 39, elephant to make it more like a mammoth
"says Kornfeldt.
Home sweet home
Once you have a Kornfeldt traveled to Siberia, where researchers are trying to recreate a laurel habitat -Mammoth.
"It was a very rich ecosystem – in some ways it was comparable to the African savanna," she says.
"There were many animals in this meadow, and when the Ice Age came to an end – and when humans came in – this ecosystem changed
"A lot of animals," says the painter Kornfeldt
Without access to a living woolly mammoth, researchers flew in an unlikely substitute.
"They have this old Soviet tank that they drive and cut down with trees," says Kornfeldt.
"One of the functions of a mammoth, like elephants, is to cut down trees so that the grass has a place to go."
A genetic moonshot
– The mammoth-like creature was a possibility, why would we care?
By selling to the public the original 1969 moonshot in the United States, John F. Kennedy recognized the benefits of taking on a huge challenge:
Go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because that they are easy, but because they are difficult, because this goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and our skills. "
Kornfeldt says cloning the woolly mammoth could have similar benefits to the Apollo program.
" We I did not go to the moon to collect gold or something we have simply to go through the process – and in the same way, thinking about something like that has great value in itself.
"This makes researchers more aware of how different genes and their functions work, what kind of genes you can change, and which genes you can not change, and how it all fits. . " 19659044] A drawing of a pigeon with bronze feathers on his neck. Hills in the background. "title =" Passenger pigeon "width =" 700 "height =" 467 "/> [1965] [19] More practical reasons for desertification Some researchers are trying to bring back extinct species to rebalance the ecosystems that are suffering from their disappearance. In 1914, the last traveling pigeon died in captivity, but only 50 years before it was probably the most numerous bird in the world. "It was a pigeon that lived in very dense flocks," says Kornfeldt. ] So dense, she said, there were descriptions of "sky falling dark and pigeon poop falling like snow". "At very irregular intervals, they entered and disturbed everything," she says. " Improvements in communications and transportation in the United States have made it possible to track, hunt and transport the meat of the racing pigeons and, for a time, to transplant them. The population of racing pigeons has dropped, never recovered Kornfeldt says that the extinction of the pigeon has sown the seeds of the modern environmental movement. "The thought that you could lose something that was so abundant really woke up peo Far from simply aiming for a laboratory specimen, researchers are striving to bring the pigeon traveler by the millions in order to relocate the species in the North American ecosystem. [19659006"TheywantnewwaterturbulantsflyingintheUnitedStates"explainsKornfeldt The big question is whether we should spend money for the de-extinction or conservation, she said, she asked this question to all the extinguishing researchers that she met. "They all agreed that if it was a clear choice between these two alternatives, you should try to save the species that are here today. " " But it's rarely the choice. " The Traveling Pigeon is an example of a species whose resurrection might have r tangible benefits for the environment. "The fact that this species is extinct is threatened Kornfeldt says:" Bringing it back could actually … revive and revitalize some of these troubled ecosystems. "
Topics: science and technology, genetic, dna, cloning-and-dna dinosaurs, birds, Sweden, United States, Australia
Photo:
Hunting and deforestation in the 1800s killed the racing pigeon.
De-extinction versus conservation
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