Holocene Park.

The term “extinction” may soon hold a new meaning entirely, in that it may one day no longer refer to species lost over the course of time, but rather refer to the lack of currently living, complete instances of a species. What I mean by this, of course, is that so long as DNA from a lost species is available, the species can be brought back, which is precisely what Australian researchers are trying to do.

The Tasmanian Tiger, deemed extinct when the last purported specimen died in captivity in 1936, could very well return from extincton within a decade. Known less commonly as the Thylacine, the species may be brought back thanks to DNA extracted from dead samples stored in ethanol at an Australian museum.

The precedent this may set, of course, could be fantastical. If a clone is successfully born, it may influence efforts to bring back other extinct animals, and there are plenty more of them. The very fact that few people outside of Australia even know what a Tasmanian Tiger is is somewhat shocking; are we that removed from man’s destruction of animal species that we don’t even grow up knowing what we’ve killed off?

I’m not only interested in the resurrection itself, but whether or not a cloned species will properly replace the original. I’ve been rather removed from news stories of late discussing the behavioral patterns of more recently-cloned animals, and I’m curious as to whether or not there’s a noticeable difference between cloned animals and their “naturally”-born counterparts.

Even more interesting is the idea of reintroducing a once-extinct species back into the wild. Has the lack of this animal impacted the natural environment in a way that will make reintroduction of the species more difficult?

At least we’re not using frog DNA to help bring back man-eating goliaths.

Tagged as: mendax.org