A US biotech company has genetically modified mice to have traits from the extinct woolly mammoth. Researchers at Colossal Laboratories and Biosciences endowed their mice with the thick, shaggy hair of the mammoth and its efficient fat metabolism, which helped it survive in icy conditions.
Colossal’s ultimate goal is to introduce these woolly mammoth traits, along with others, into modern elephants. This general area of science has become known as de-extinction.
However, elephants have long gestation (pregnancy) periods, exhibit complex social behaviour, and experimentation on them raises significant ethical challenges, including the issue of animal welfare. Therefore, the researchers have chosen mice for the initial experiments.
