Hey, just in time for scary worldwide climate change, comes the wooly mammoth. Sounds familiar, right? A team of Japanese, Russian, and American scientists based out of Japan’s Kyoto University is working to clone a big hairy beast from the Earth’s last ice age.
The scientists hope to clone a baby mammoth within the next six years by extracting DNA from the body of a preserved mammoth. The DNA will then be injected into the cells of an African elephant.
Scientist Akira Iritani, the head of the team is working with techniques used to clone a mouse from frozen cells. Once cloned, the scientists plan to study the mammoth to learn more about its species. Says Iritani,
If a cloned embryo can be created, we need to discuss, before transplanting it into the womb, how to breed [the mammoth] and whether to display it to the public. After the mammoth is born, we’ll examine its ecology and genes to study why the species became extinct and other factors.
No word on plans for an amusement park built around the cloned extinct animals.
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