De-extinction?

lpetrich · Post by **lpetrich** » Mon Jan 15, 2018 3:22 am

25 animals that scientists want to bring back from extinction

1. Caspian Tiger
2. Aurochs
3. Carolina Parakeet
4. Cuban Macaw
5. Dodo
6. Woolly Mammoth
7. Labrador Duck
8. Woolly Rhinoceros
9. Heath Hen
10. Ivory-billed Woodpecker
11. Imperial Woodpecker
12. Moa
13. Elephant Bird
14. Pyrenean Ibex
15. Quagga
16. Chinese River Dolphin (Baiji)
17. Tasmanian Tiger
18. Irish Elk
19. Caribbean Monk Seal
20. Huia
21. Moho
22. Steller's Sea Cow
23. Passenger Pigeon
24. Gastric-brooding Frog
25. Great Auk

Some other possibilities:
Giant ground sloth
Glyptodont (giant armadillo)
Dire wolf
Sabertooth cat

Lots of (Wikipedia)

Charismatic megafauna, it must be conceded.

All these species became extinct in the Holocene or shortly before, and we have been able to get good DNA samples for some of them. But before that, it does not seem possible. We won't be able to bring back any of the (non-avian) dinosaurs.

lpetrich · Post by **lpetrich** » Mon Jan 15, 2018 4:11 am

Scientists Plan to 'De-Extinct' a Big Ancient Cow -- How to Bring Back the Auroch? : News : Nature World News, Wild supercows return to Europe - CNN Aurochsen were wild oxen, the wild ancestors of domestic bovines.

From the first link,

One of them is Operation Taurus. Telegraph notes that the program has selectively bred 300 calves with aurochs DNA through something called back-breeding. They selected breeds of cattle which have certain auroch characteristics, and each generation of calves may get closer to the original aurochs in appearance, behavior and genetic makeup.

There are a lot of cattle breeds that the scientists are using which have characteristics closest to the aurochs. These include the Maremmana from Italy and the Podolica and Busha breeds from the Balkans.

Donato Matassino from the Operation Taurus said they have the highest percentage of aurochs genetic material. Though he said we may not be able to create aurochs that are 100-percent like the original.

Scientists Sequence Genome of Extinct Eurasian Wild Aurochs | Genetics | Sci-News.com, Tauros Programme Rewilding Europe -- for making an aurochs approximation by selective breeding, starting from some of the more aurochs-like breeds of domestic bovines.

Rewilding Europe Making Europe a Wilder Place also mentions rewilding horses and European bison.

Revive & Restore | Genetic Rescue to Enhance Biodiversity
Is working on protecting horseshoe crabs and restoring black-footed ferrets.

In the United States, one species of horseshoe crab (Limulus sp.) is harvested annually in huge numbers by the pharmaceutical industry and bled alive, its blood used to create the biomedical test, Limulus Amebocyte Lysate (LAL). LAL is the gold standard for endotoxin testing in vaccines and injectable biomedical devices (human and pets). Every drug certified by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration must be tested using LAL. Global demand for this testing process is very high and growing. In the U.S., estuaries like Delaware Bay where Horseshoe crabs go to spawn each spring currently support only one third the population that habitat models predict they should.

A synthetic alternative, known as recombinant factor C (rFC), was developed approximately 15 years ago but has not achieved sufficient market penetration to supplant the bleeding of horseshoe crabs by any significant amount. Understanding exactly why that is the case remains a mystery that Revive & Restore is trying to solve.

For the heath hen, passenger pigeon, and woolly mammoth, the R&R people are doing genetic engineering on the genomes of close relatives: the prairie chicken, band-tailed pigeon, and Asian elephant.

Aupmanyav · Post by **Aupmanyav** » Tue Jan 16, 2018 7:24 am

Big cows, more methane emission. Milk is not a favorite drink now. Any way to produce big chocolate (that is the favorite now)?

Jobar · Post by **Jobar** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 3:18 am

I'd be worried that even if we managed to re-create the genome for, i.e., the passenger pigeon, re-establishing the ecological niche which would allow the species to thrive would be much more of a problem.

As for the aurochs, the fossils of them I've seen look sorta like a cross between a cow and a tank. Mean-looking suckers. I'd be mighty cautious about putting them anywhere near people.

dancer_rnb · Post by **dancer_rnb** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 6:05 am

The niche for the passenger pigeon might be occupied, but it is not gone. It's only been effectively extinct for maybe 150 years? Last one died in 1914.

Sey · Post by **Sey** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 7:29 am

We're rapidly destroying habitat for the plants and animals we have now. Where are we planning to put these resurrected species?

Politesse · Post by **Politesse** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 3:01 pm

It may be that I'm getting as bad as Aup when it comes to relating everything back to my local issues, but... there are a few California species that would constitute a valuable boon in a very practical sense, if reintroduced. I'd put in a vote for the Northrotheriops ground sloth, in part because it was actually an integral part of the life cycle of the Joshua tree, itself a lynchpin species for the entire Mojave biome. Those are the funny spiky trees you see in the background of Hollywood desert scenes, and though really cool and ecologically important, are deeply endangered. Park rangers have been trying to help the trees manually, but are nowhere near as efficient, and as climate change has rapidly shifted the viable range of the trees upward into the hills, they are even more hard-pressed. Even if we had to baby them along, a small managed population of pollinators would be helpful. You can read more about this curious issue at Missing Sloths, Modern Pollution, and The Fate of the Joshua Tree.

We know much less about the ecological role of the California grizzly (which is not on your list) but it would also be a good candidate for experimentation as we have loads of genetic material and it's thought that another brown bear could probably bring one to term, so it has a more viable surrogate than some of the other creatures on the list. I'm not sure how it would affect, say, our Valley wildlife refuges, but at the very least we'd be undoing the embarrassment of killing off our own state animal! Conservationists have been pushing for the return of some kind of grizzly for decades, but our own subspecies would be more fun I think.

Politesse · Post by **Politesse** » Wed Jan 17, 2018 3:08 pm

[quote=""Sey""]We're rapidly destroying habitat for the plants and animals we have now. Where are we planning to put these resurrected species?[/quote]

See my post above for an example.

The truth is that rapid species loss is a major cause of habitat loss, also. Look how the American/Canadian Plains and their wildlife have been dying for the lack of bison herds, how the Northeast is suffering with its reduced beaver population, the herbivorous overpopulation of most of the Subarctic due to predator extinctions, the critical die-offs of ocean animals for lack of a sufficient krill population. It's likely that many of the now-extinct organisms most plausible as de-extinction candidates, being recently deceased, are also those who still have a valuable role to play in their still-extant ecological niche.

Also, the more diverse a spread of subspecies and breeds one has within a given genus, the less likely your remaining population is going to get carried off in a sudden plague or disaster.

dancer_rnb · Post by **dancer_rnb** » Thu Jan 18, 2018 2:34 am

It would be interesting to see what Mammoths or Mastodons would change.

Hermit · Post by **Hermit** » Thu Jan 18, 2018 12:14 pm

[quote=""Jobar""]I'd be worried that even if we managed to re-create the genome for, i.e., the passenger pigeon, re-establishing the ecological niche which would allow the species to thrive would be much more of a problem.

As for the aurochs, the fossils of them I've seen look sorta like a cross between a cow and a tank. Mean-looking suckers. I'd be mighty cautious about putting them anywhere near people.[/quote]
The last Aurochs died around the middle of the 17th century. In 2009 a British farmer, Derek Gow, tried to resurrect them by resuming a project started by the Heck brothers in recreating them eight decades earlier. Six years later he culled most of the cattle because they were too aggressive to handle. (Link)

Aupmanyav · Post by **Aupmanyav** » Thu Jan 18, 2018 12:35 pm

What about Aurochs, we first have to safe-guard ourselves against pollution in cities today. Delhi air is bad all through the year. This time it was so bad that the Indian and Sri Lankan cricketers vomited during a game here in Delhi and had to inhale oxygen.

Hermit · Post by **Hermit** » Thu Jan 18, 2018 12:43 pm

[quote=""Aupmanyav""]What about Aurochs, we first have to safe-guard ourselves against pollution in cities today. Delhi air is bad all through the year. This time it was so bad that the Indian and Sri Lankan cricketers vomited during a game here in Delhi and had to inhale oxygen.[/quote]This thread is about de-extinction. Why don't you start one about pollution in cities? It's safe to say that this forum's server can accommodate both, and then some.

Peanut · Post by **Peanut** » Fri Jan 19, 2018 5:40 am

Some questions that occur:
In what size of populations are they thinking of recreating these species?
A couple dozen passenger pigeons, no problem... or at least maybe not a huge problem. In the hundreds of thousands - where are the acorns, hickories, beeches, and chestnuts to feed them?

It's the same with every resurrected extinct species. They died out for a reason. How can you put back their breeding grounds, food sources, limiting factors, migrations routes - iow, their ecological infrastructure?

You can't. There are humans everywhere, messing up everything.
FCS, leave the dead to rest in peace!

Politesse · Post by **Politesse** » Fri Jan 19, 2018 3:35 pm

[quote=""Peanut""]Some questions that occur:
In what size of populations are they thinking of recreating these species?
A couple dozen passenger pigeons, no problem... or at least maybe not a huge problem. In the hundreds of thousands - where are the acorns, hickories, beeches, and chestnuts to feed them?

It's the same with every resurrected extinct species. They died out for a reason. How can you put back their breeding grounds, food sources, limiting factors, migrations routes - iow, their ecological infrastructure?

You can't. There are humans everywhere, messing up everything.
FCS, leave the dead to rest in peace![/quote]

If we choose to do nothing about the mass extinctions we are daily engendering, we will join their ranks presently.

Jobar · Post by **Jobar** » Sat Jan 20, 2018 2:30 pm

That's an all too real possibility, and has been for longer than most of us have been alive. I don't know if we could manage to cause an extinction event to rival the Great Dying at the end of the Permian, but I feel pretty sure we could do as thorough a job as the Dinosaur Killer did.

Angra Mainyu · Post by **Angra Mainyu** » Sun Jan 21, 2018 8:41 pm

Politesse wrote: If we choose to do nothing about the mass extinctions we are daily engendering, we will join their ranks presently.

How do you think that might happen? (i.e., by what mechanism would humans also become extinct?).

Politesse · Post by **Politesse** » Sun Jan 21, 2018 9:44 pm

[quote=""Angra Mainyu""]

Politesse wrote: If we choose to do nothing about the mass extinctions we are daily engendering, we will join their ranks presently.

How do you think that might happen? (i.e., by what mechanism would humans also become extinct?).[/quote]

Oh, that's a conscious exaggeration; humans are clever, and some small number of us are apt to survive any particular disaster. Still, any number of things could do us in. We're changing the chemical composition of the ocean considerably, as well as killing off our primary pollinators, sources of medicine, and wild game. If I had to guess, a killer pathogen of some kind is our most likely foe.

Aupmanyav · Post by **Aupmanyav** » Mon Jan 22, 2018 7:33 am

There is a meteorite of the size of Burj Khalifa visiting us soon. Hope it does not change its trajectory for any reason. But I think that is not big enough - Burj Khalifa!