Are you planning to toru – or are you just making a big fuss?
Scientists want to revive the woolly mammoth that has been extinct for several thousand years. Many newspapers report unanimously on this. According to this, Colossal, a company specializing in genetic research, has raised US $ 15 million (equivalent to about 12.7 million euros) for this coup.
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The plan looks like this: Researchers want to cross-breed giant DNA, well-preserved from eternal ice, with Asian elephants. The embryo must be carried artificially or in a surrogate mother animal. If all goes well, scientists expect the first giant elephant to have babies in six years.
The resulting shaggy mixture with long hair has to be transferred to the tundra. It is a barren plain in the south of the Arctic, where the thermometer rarely rises above zero degrees.
Hairy contemporaries: Researchers want to bring woolly mammoth back to lifePhoto: Brand X Pictures/Getty Images
“Our goal is to make a cold-resistant elephant, but it will look and act like a giant. Not because we’re trying to deceive someone, but because we want something that’s functionally equivalent to a giant.” Ho. an animal that enjoys its time at minus 40 degrees and does all the things that elephants and mammoths do – especially pushing trees,” George Church told Dame “Guardian”. The Harvard professor is the co-founder of the research company Colossal.
According to scientists, the revival of mammoths mainly serves the environment. On the one hand, this should strengthen the endangered population of Asian elephants. On the other hand, the reproduction of giant hybrids helps the tundra habitat, which accounts for five percent of Earth’s total land area, and thus the fight against climate change.
Other scientists are skeptical of the plans. Victoria Herridge, an evolutionary biologist at the Natural History Museum in London, called the plans “justifications” that are “unthinkable”. “The scope of this experiment is huge. We’re talking hundreds of thousands of mammoths, each of which takes years to grow.” Ecology professor Gareth Phoenix warned of the “unintended, harmful consequences” of such a revival.
The plan to allow extinct animals to be trampled on the earth again is not new. Appropriate approaches existed ten years ago. What is new is the high amount to be invested in the project.
Time will tell whether this time really Toru.
