Russians Recover Fresh Flowing Mammoth Blood

[Emperor Maximilian]

Could Jurassic Park be far off?  Let's hope we don't have to deal with the same mayhem that went down there.

[chitoryu12]

The problem with cloning is that it's more difficult than just needing workable material. Even if they can get DNA out of the mammoth blood and "fill in the gaps" or be lucky enough to get something that's intact, they need an egg to fertilize with it and possibly some kind of womb that can nurture it (if they don't hatch the creature from a laid egg). The raptors of Jurassic Park would have responded to their DNA being put into ostrich eggs by curling up and dying immediately in the hostile environment.

[Random Gal]

Then the question is whether elephants are sufficiently different from mammoths to cause such problems.

[R. U. Sirius]

I have read articles where scientists suggest "intermediary" cloning as a method to bring back extinct species. Build a hybrid between a modern species and its extinct relative that's enough like the modern to survive the womb, then use that hybrid as a basis to build another that's closer to the original, and on and on until you get something functionally identical to the original.

Though, if they did clone mammoths back to life, wouldn't they need to figure out a way to work in a seasonal-shedding adaptation?

[chitoryu12]

I have read articles where scientists suggest "intermediary" cloning as a method to bring back extinct species. Build a hybrid between a modern species and its extinct relative that's enough like the modern to survive the womb, then use that hybrid as a basis to build another that's closer to the original, and on and on until you get something functionally identical to the original.

Yeah, the hardest part is actually finding a way to birth the animal. All that DNA is useless except for research purposes if you can't find a viable womb. The Jurassic Park novel actually dealt with that in a way: it pointed out that they had created "monsters" rather than true dinosaurs, and they had spliced the DNA with other animals to create something viable. Though they did go too far with how effective the splicing was and use an impossible egg for dramatic license.

Then the question is whether elephants are sufficiently different from mammoths to cause such problems.

Yep. All the way back in 2005, they traced the mammoth lineage for common ancestry. An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

If they create something viable that can be birthed by an elephant, the genetic modifications will mean that it's really not a mammoth at all.

[worlder]

A revived species of mammoth would probably only exist in captivity.

Also unless the wool and meat are somehow cost effective, I think they'll only be good for zoo exhibits.

[chitoryu12]

A revived species of mammoth would probably only exist in captivity.

Also unless the wool and meat are somehow cost effective, I think they'll only be good for zoo exhibits.

I think it would be more cost effective to clone existing animals that have already had their DNA sequenced and have reliably eggs to fertilize and wombs to grow them in, rather than something extinct.

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

If mammoth breeding farms aren't officially named "Mammaries", I'm going to be angry.

[Random Gal]

An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

To be fair, human/chimpanzee hasn't been tested either. Not that I think such an experiment would be ethical or that anybody would (or should) ever try it, just that we don't know whether it's possible.

[R. U. Sirius]

An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

To be fair, human/chimpanzee hasn't been tested either. Not that I think such an experiment would be ethical or that anybody would (or should) ever try it, just that we don't know whether it's possible.

I read a book called "Monkeys on the Interstate" by a zookeeper who was famous back in the 80s. He said that once, when trying to hand-raise a baby monkey, he hit upon the idea of his wife, who had recently given birth to their first child, serving as wetnurse. She refused, but later admitted that she might have tried it if she didn't think he would have told his staff about it.

[wrightway]

An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

To be fair, human/chimpanzee hasn't been tested either. Not that I think such an experiment would be ethical or that anybody would (or should) ever try it, just that we don't know whether it's possible.

Humans and chimps are closer genetically than horses and zebras, and zorses are not an unheard of thing. Michael Crichton wrote a book that dealt with the ethical complications of such a hybrid, would something of mixed human DNA qualify for human rights and the like. It's a decent read.

[chitoryu12]

An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

To be fair, human/chimpanzee hasn't been tested either. Not that I think such an experiment would be ethical or that anybody would (or should) ever try it, just that we don't know whether it's possible.

Highly unlikely. Humans and monkeys are extremely closely related, but we ALSO share a lot of DNA with, say, bananas. It needs to be an unusually close match for a womb to be non-hostile to the fetus and for the egg to be viable for the sperm.

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

To be fair, human/chimpanzee hasn't been tested either. Not that I think such an experiment would be ethical or that anybody would (or should) ever try it, just that we don't know whether it's possible.

Humans and chimps are closer genetically than horses and zebras, and zorses are not an unheard of thing. Michael Crichton wrote a book that dealt with the ethical complications of such a hybrid, would something of mixed human DNA qualify for human rights and the like. It's a decent read.

Humans and chimps share a lot of DNA, but like all non-human great apes, chimps have 24 chromosomes, while humans only have 23 (due to chromosomes 2p and 2q fusing together into chromosome 2 at some point in human evolution), so that would be a pretty major roadblock to producing viable offspring.

[wrightway]

An elephant cannot birth a mammoth any more than a human can birth a chimpanzee.

To be fair, human/chimpanzee hasn't been tested either. Not that I think such an experiment would be ethical or that anybody would (or should) ever try it, just that we don't know whether it's possible.

Humans and chimps are closer genetically than horses and zebras, and zorses are not an unheard of thing. Michael Crichton wrote a book that dealt with the ethical complications of such a hybrid, would something of mixed human DNA qualify for human rights and the like. It's a decent read.

Humans and chimps share a lot of DNA, but like all non-human great apes, chimps have 24 chromosomes, while humans only have 23 (due to chromosomes 2p and 2q fusing together into chromosome 2 at some point in human evolution), so that would be a pretty major roadblock to producing viable offspring.

They actually address that in the book. I'm trying to remember how it was handled, but I remember the sole viable offspring from the experiment had a lot of health problems.

[The Right Honourable Mlle Antéchrist]

Was the novel "Next"?

The hybrid stuff in the novel was interesting, if unrealistic (rather like the gene splicing in Jurassic Park, in fact), but I found the rest of it to be overly alarmist and lacking in cohesion. Typical of Crichton's later works.

I don't recall the references to major health problems (both the chimp/human and the orangutan/human seemed fairly healthy overall), but it's been a while since I read it.