Woolly mammoth reborn in two years?

Scientists mine carcasses for DNA blueprint

BOSTON • Woolly mammoths — or, at least, animals with very similar DNA — could be brought back from extinction within two years, say scientists behind a groundbreaking resurrection project.

George Church, a worldrenowned geneticist, has been working with his team at Harvard University to recreate a DNA blueprint of the mammoth for the past two years using material from carcasses preserved in the Arctic permafrost.

They hope to isolate the genes that differentiate Ice Age mammoths from modern elephants, then splice mammoth genes with the genome of an elephant embryo to create a hybrid with the recognizable features of a mammoth. Lab tests show cells function normally with mammoth and elephant DNA and the Harvard team plans to grow a mammoth embryo in an artificial womb, rather than use a female elephant as a surrogate mother.

Since starting the project in 2015, the researchers have increased the number of “edits” where mammoth DNA has been spliced into the elephant genome from 15 to 45. Church, who heads the Harvard Woolly Mammoth Revival team, said: “We’re working on ways to evaluate the impact of all these edits and trying to establish embryogenesis.

He added: “Our aim is to produce a hybrid elephantmammoth embryo. Actually it would be more like an elephant with a number of mammoth traits. We’re not there yet, but it could happen in a couple of years.”

The woolly mammoth roamed Europe, Asia, Africa and North America during the last Ice Age and vanished some 4,500 years ago.

SEMYON GRIGORYEV / AFP / GETTY IMAGES A researcher works near a carcass of a female mammoth found on a remote island in the Arctic Ocean in 2013. A team of scientists is attempting to use genetic material to “produce a hybrid elephant-mammoth embryo.”