Commentary: This genetics firm didn't resurrect the extinct dire wolf, but did achieve a breakthrough in hype
Anyone weary of the fire hose of dire news from the White House might have found respite in an uplifting story emanating from Colossal Biosciences, a Dallas-based genetics startup, early this month: Colossal reported that it had successfully resurrected the dire wolf from its 12,000-year-long extinction.The feat was “the world’s first de-extinction,” the company said — “a revolutionary milestone of scientific progress that illustrates another leap forward in Colossal’s de-extinction technologies and is a critical step on the pathway to the de-extinction of other target species.” Its achievement drew page-one reportage and plaudits from conservationists and animal welfare groups who saw it as a path to “making extinction events a thing of the past,” as Robin R.Ganzert, chief executive of the American Humane Society, gushed on Colossal’s website.The dire wolf genome likely differs from that of the gray wolf in millions or tens of millions of ways.
Editing 14 genes is interesting, but it’s not a reconstruction or de-extinction.It’s not even close.— Paul S.
Knoepfler, UC DavisUmm, not so fast.Many in the genetics community have questioned whether the three animals produced at Colossal’s genetics laboratory and currently housed at an unidentified preserve are truly dire wolves, as opposed to modern-day gray wolves with relatively modest genetic alterations.
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“The three produced gray wolves with fifteen gene edits making them genetically a smidge more like dire wolves are not a de-extinction event,” asserts Paul S.Knoepfler, an expert in cell biology and human anatomy at UC Davis medical school.
In a post on his blog, Knoepfler called Colossal’s claims “colossal baloney” and warned, “this kind of hype is toxic and harmful to science including public trust.�...