News of the recovery of an extinct species in the form of howling, ivory-coated “dire wolf” pups last week was, on the face of it, understandably exciting. The only problem: from the vantage point of many scientists, the creatures are not dire wolves.
The lab modified 14 of the over 19,000 genes in a living gray wolf to create their pups. The resultant animals are thus only the tiniest sliver, by our estimation about 0.0018%, dire wolf. The makers of these animals also edited in some dog features that, while not from dire wolves, could be counted on to add some trademark dire wolf-y traits while avoiding possible genetic problems. This approach is the same as has been used in other such “de-extinction” efforts. For example, the announced “woolly mice”—billed last month as a stepping stone to woolly mammoths—got their shaggy hair from genes that had nothing to do with mammoths. The logic here is something like: If the final product looks like a Louis Vuitton bag, does it really matter if it was fabricated out of different materials?
The challenge with so-called de-extinction efforts is that, in our view, they actually pull the spotlight away from one of the gravest crises on the planet: the accelerating decline and extinction of nature. A century of research has shown us that each lost species of dolphin, rhino, frog, tortoise, butterfly, and bird has been like pulling out a block in the jenga tower that sustains human health, food, water, and livelihoods. These dire wolves and other creatures that may be “de-extincted” don’t necessarily behave, eat, or sound like the species they allegedly replicate. As such, they cannot fill back in the gaps of this beautiful tower of life.
Indeed, the suggestion that we just solved extinction is insulting to the thousands of people who have dedicated their lives, and sometimes sacrificed them, doing the hard, real, but often unsexy work of protecting endangered species.
Gray wolf conservation, for example, is a complicated push and pull of managing large carnivores that often end up in places where the easiest meal is someone’s livelihood. Of the coalition of scientists, politicians, wildlife managers, and community groups who helped reintroduce 14 gray wolves to Yellowstone Park in 1995, many would agree that sourcing and releasing wolves was not the hard part, it is instead the perpetual need to manage and protect what has grown to become nearly 3,000 wolves across seven western states. Those efforts include constant monitoring of wolves through GPS and other technology, sustained investment in development and deployment of tools to protect livestock and pets, and widespread compensation programs to address the economic impacts of wolf depredation. We have engaged these challenges first-hand as partners in the management of California’s rapidly recovering gray wolf population. Creating genetically-modified gray wolves that are larger, hungrier, and stronger is not on anyone’s list of priorities. Colossal Biosciences, the company that engineered the “dire wolves,” has stated that it eventually hopes to restore these species to ecological preserves or on indigenous lands. There is no scenario in which the naturalization of the creatures manufactured in the dire wolf project would be anything other than a Jurassic Park-sized mistake.
Normalizing transgenic approaches and capitalizing on “de-extincted” animals under the guise of nature conservation is dangerous, but it doesn’t mean there is no role for the use of advanced technology in fighting extinction. Quite the opposite. We must throw everything we have at the extinction crisis including the most cutting-edge technologies at our disposal. But as a community, we must use these tools intelligently, transparently, and ethically.
Consider Elizabeth Ann, a charismatic black-footed ferret born in 2020 with the distinction of being the first ever cloned endangered species. Elizabeth Ann is the clone of a ferret named Willa who died in the 1980s. Bringing back complete versions of endangered species from decades-old frozen cells may not be as sexy as the promise of a reimagined mammoth or dire wolf, but the resurrection of Elizabeth Ann reintroduced badly needed genetic diversity into an endangered and ecologically important ferret population thereby slowing the impacts of inbreeding. Similar types of efforts have been undertaken in hopes to benefit the extinct Pyrenean Ibex, the Banteng (and endangered Bovid), the pink pigeon, and the wild Przewalski’s Horse.
Or take the case of Sudan, a northern white rhino who died in 2018 leaving only two remaining representatives of this species. Scientists are using advanced IVF techniques (first developed to help human couples facing fertility issues), a surrogate rhino mom, and Sudan’s frozen sperm in an effort to bring white rhinos back from the precipice of extinction. It has taken a team effort to see this technically challenging but important project advance over the past decade. This has included contributions from the Kenya Wildlife Service, Ol Pejeta Conservancy, Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Safari Park Dvůr Králové, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, Avantea, Helping Rhinos, Colossal Biosciences (the same that was behind the dire wolf and woolly mouse projects), and Scripps Research. If these scientists succeed, technology will have helped produce a baby rhino that is 100% natural northern white rhino—not an imitation or amalgamation marketed as an ecological replacement.
The case of the black-footed ferret and northern white rhino help to highlight some of the attributes of projects where de-extinction technologies can be usefully employed to combat extinction. This includes focusing on species that can be resurrected with full genetic integrity and investing in species that can realistically be reintroduced back into the wild today and grow to population sizes that actually restore lost ecological functions.
There is much we also can and must learn through analogy with the human experience when considering right and wrong ways to meaningfully and ethically put new tools to work in conservation. Society almost instinctively recognizes that there are lines associated with the use of genetic tools that should not be crossed: augmentation or editing of children to maximize sports achievement, creation of super-soldiers, etc. But many scientists and governments also agree that using genetic technologies to improve health outcomes, such as CRISPR powered CAR T-cell therapy to save the lives of cancer patients, can be well-justified.
Editing small portions of DNA from extinct species into modern relatives with the goal of declaring extinction solved is an example of science and society doing shallow work with some of the deepest technology ever invented. All of this as the clock of extinction ticks forward on irreplaceable species that share this planet with us right now.
We would do well to instead appreciate the inspiring and fearsome stuff of legend in our remaining real gray wolves and to continue the hard conversations and hard work needed to keep them on the planet. And to similarly stay the course with the thousands of other species facing off against extinction today. Winning the battle against extinction is going to require more from us than manufacturing mutant wolves and hairy mice.
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