DIRE EFFORTS: ON DE-EXTINCTION AND CONSERVATION

Colossal Biosciences is an American company with an unusual marketing line: combining genomics with conservation — not in its traditional form, but through de-extinction, which is resurrecting species extinct for thousands of years. Leading this project is Harvard geneticist George Church,

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a prominent promoter of the company, who aims to bring back the woolly mammoth, a distant ancestor of the elephant. The stated logic is to combat global warming. During the Pleistocene Ice Ages,

the mammoth roamed lush grasslands across the tundra. Until its extinction around 5,000 years ago, the Arctic tundra also supported large populations of bison, wolves, cave lions,

and giant deer. As the climate warmed, these species disappeared, and the grasslands gave way to shrubbery and sheets of snow.

As temperatures rise, permafrost begins to disappear, resulting in high emissions of methane, a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.