Theories
The woolly mammoth became extinct during the Quaternary extinction event. Some of the last woolly mammoths that the world knew of were surviving as late as 1700 B.C.E. The extinction of the woolly mammoth is popularly believed to be caused by humans. Humans may have caused the woolly mammoth’s extinction by over-hunting; because of the woolly mammoth’s slow birth rate, producing enough offspring to make up for the number of deaths was difficult.
However, others argue that climate change was more to blame, leaving a species adapted for freezing climates ill-prepared to deal with a suddenly warming world. It has been long known that a herd of woolly mammoths survived up until about 4,000 years ago on what is now Russia’s Wrangel Island, north of Siberia in the Arctic Ocean. Once connected to the mainland by an ice bridge, Wrangel was gradually cut off by water 12,000 to 9,000 years ago. A loss of genetic variation could also have resulted from the shift in climate as Earth entered the interglacial period. However, to researchers’ surprise, genetic diversity remained stable, and even increased slightly, right up to the extinction, making a disease the cause of the extinction less of an option. Humans appeared to have arrived on the island about 100 years after the woolly mammoths had vanished. This would exculpate humans from killing off the last of mammoths, but it is possible that humans arrived earlier and left no trace. Researchers hypothesize that a catastrophic event, such as a mega-storm, or bacteria or virus could have wiped out the remaining woolly mammoth population.
However, others argue that climate change was more to blame, leaving a species adapted for freezing climates ill-prepared to deal with a suddenly warming world. It has been long known that a herd of woolly mammoths survived up until about 4,000 years ago on what is now Russia’s Wrangel Island, north of Siberia in the Arctic Ocean. Once connected to the mainland by an ice bridge, Wrangel was gradually cut off by water 12,000 to 9,000 years ago. A loss of genetic variation could also have resulted from the shift in climate as Earth entered the interglacial period. However, to researchers’ surprise, genetic diversity remained stable, and even increased slightly, right up to the extinction, making a disease the cause of the extinction less of an option. Humans appeared to have arrived on the island about 100 years after the woolly mammoths had vanished. This would exculpate humans from killing off the last of mammoths, but it is possible that humans arrived earlier and left no trace. Researchers hypothesize that a catastrophic event, such as a mega-storm, or bacteria or virus could have wiped out the remaining woolly mammoth population.
De-extinction
In 2007, an international team of researchers announced the discovery of a perfectly preserved woolly mammoth calf that had been buried under western Siberia’s thick permafrost for at least 10,000 years until spotted by reindeer herder, Yuri Khudy. Named “Lyuba” after Khudy’s wife, the carcass will provide researchers with the material necessary to decode the woolly mammoth’s genome. While other researchers plan to work on the mammoth’s genetic code, paleontologist, Daniel Fisher, of the University of Michigan, plans to study to mammoth’s teeth and tusks to learn more about the species’ development and maturation rates.
Following the discovery of “Lyuba”, scientists proposed the idea to bring back the woolly mammoth; or to bring in another case of de-extinction. The process of de-extinction involves the idea that sequenceable DNA can be recovered from museum specimens and some fossils of extinct species. That discovery in the 1980s set into motion the idea that it might be possible to bring some extinct animals back to life. Genomic technology being developed today has the potential to revive extinct species and can be used to prevent extinction in some endangered species.
The idea of a possible de-extinction plan was introduced, and the topic was widely reported and discussed. Debate was encouraged, and the subject inevitably became “controversial”. Public worries centered on what would happen when formerly extinct animals are reintroduced to the wild. Conversationists voiced few concerns, because they know how common it is today to successfully reintroduce animals to the wild after a long absence. The two topics that worry conservation professionals are that the de-extinction would be so expensive that it would divert needed money and attention away from programs to protect endangered species. The other worry is that the great warning that “extinction is forever” will lose its meaning, and politicians will stop funding the protection of endangered species.
The most practical worries, however, are the more technical ones. These are focused mainly on the extreme complexity of resurrecting extinct genomes, because it has never been done. There is also the task of converting gene data into living genes. This is common in synthetic biology today, but shifting a whole organisms worth of extinct traits into a living genome has yet to occur. The final question scientists ask is whether the resurrected animal is really the extinct animal. If it looks the woolly mammoth and behaves like one, that doesn’t necessarily mean it is the woolly mammoth. Regardless of what occurs, reintroduction of the woolly mammoth will take a large amount of time and energy. The technological theories of the de-extinction of the woolly mammoth accentuates the true depth of the Modern Revolution.
Following the discovery of “Lyuba”, scientists proposed the idea to bring back the woolly mammoth; or to bring in another case of de-extinction. The process of de-extinction involves the idea that sequenceable DNA can be recovered from museum specimens and some fossils of extinct species. That discovery in the 1980s set into motion the idea that it might be possible to bring some extinct animals back to life. Genomic technology being developed today has the potential to revive extinct species and can be used to prevent extinction in some endangered species.
The idea of a possible de-extinction plan was introduced, and the topic was widely reported and discussed. Debate was encouraged, and the subject inevitably became “controversial”. Public worries centered on what would happen when formerly extinct animals are reintroduced to the wild. Conversationists voiced few concerns, because they know how common it is today to successfully reintroduce animals to the wild after a long absence. The two topics that worry conservation professionals are that the de-extinction would be so expensive that it would divert needed money and attention away from programs to protect endangered species. The other worry is that the great warning that “extinction is forever” will lose its meaning, and politicians will stop funding the protection of endangered species.
The most practical worries, however, are the more technical ones. These are focused mainly on the extreme complexity of resurrecting extinct genomes, because it has never been done. There is also the task of converting gene data into living genes. This is common in synthetic biology today, but shifting a whole organisms worth of extinct traits into a living genome has yet to occur. The final question scientists ask is whether the resurrected animal is really the extinct animal. If it looks the woolly mammoth and behaves like one, that doesn’t necessarily mean it is the woolly mammoth. Regardless of what occurs, reintroduction of the woolly mammoth will take a large amount of time and energy. The technological theories of the de-extinction of the woolly mammoth accentuates the true depth of the Modern Revolution.