What previously could only be imagined in Hollywood movies like Jurassic Park has become quite realistic a script for scientists, reports the German newspaper Die Welt. Now genetic scientists from around the world are working on animal cloning, extinct tens of thousands of years ago.
So, most recently – at the end of March this year – to researchers from Australian University of New South Wales succeeded reproduce the genome of a rare species of frogs that have completely disappeared from continent in the early 80s of the last century.
Tilacin – Tasmanian tiger
A photo from open sources
True, the publication notes, the resulting embryos were unsustainable – just as happened with the cloned in 2009, the Pyrenees mountain goat, who died just a a few minutes after birth. However, scientists are not upset and hope for a speedy breakthrough in cloning extinct species.
“With frogs, this could have happened after 2-3 years of work, – says geneticist at Canadian University of McMaster Hendrick Poinar. – But the world could see cloned mammoths only in 20-30 years. “Although, the scientist notes, one cannot exclude the possibility that this could happen earlier.
Researchers also plan to “resurrect” the Tasmanian tiger, disappeared in the 30s of the XX century, and extinct in the XVII century birds a dodo unable to fly. Japanese scientists, says Die Welt, generally going to recreate a mammoth until 2017. Similar their South Korean colleagues also have plans.
The only thing scientists need for this is a piece of tissue extinct species with well-preserved DNA. “For cloning DNA is even suitable, even 200 years old, ” edition.
As Moritz Gatman writes in the article, The Curse of the Mammoth, published in the German magazine Focus, in Yakutia – the area of eternal permafrost, a large “refrigerator” hiding a huge amount forgotten life forms – behind the fossil remains of extinct animals a real hunt unfolded.
Sometimes it spills human blood. After all, besides government search parties engaged in research in scientific purposes and confiscating everything without looking back and any compensation, friend a large number of “mammoth hunters” compete with a friend, explains the journalist.
“Just one well-preserved mammoth tusk can bring the lucky man who found him Gatman continues. – The price of a pair (tusks) in excellent condition in general may be about 75 thousand euros. ”
Moreover, after the tusks were banned in 1990 elephants, mammoth tusks, from which a variety of things are cut – starting from chess and ending with decorations, they only added to cost. As you know, a necklace made of this “ethical” material even the first lady of the United States, Michelle Obama.
Mammoth DNA
