Mammoths may roam again after 27,000 years

[Placebo]

BODIES of extinct Ice Age mammals, such as woolly mammoths, that have been frozen in permafrost for thousands of years may contain viable sperm that could be used to bring them back from the dead, scientists said yesterday.

Research has indicated that mammalian sperm can survive being frozen for much longer than was previously thought, suggesting that it could potentially be recovered from species that have died out.

Several well-preserved mammoth carcasses have been found in the permafrost of Siberia, and scientists estimate that there could be millions more.

Last year a Canadian team demonstrated that it was possible to extract DNA from the specimens, and announced the sequencing of about 1 per cent of the genome of a mammoth that died about 27,000 years ago.

More...

Only 50% Mammoth? Why that's no Mammoth at all! ;)

[MADem]

1. Hmmm, I anticipated a story about the SUPERSIZE ME culture! NT

[KittyWampus]

60. What gets me, we're driving elephants to extinction but bringing back

their genetic ancestors that already are extinct.

This will bolster the Psuedo-Christian assertion that Elephants and Mammoths existed at the same time... at least in their fund raising flyers.

[Mythsaje]

2. But we already HAVE a giant bohemoth that consumes

far more resources than to which it's entitled....

we call it Rush.

[Patchuli]

3. Don't forget

Bill O'Lielly! I think he overconsumes as well...

[saigon68]

63. The Hateful right wing Fat Ass

LOL

[skids]

4. Good, we'll need something to hunt...

...after the current global idiocracy plunges us back into the stone age.

[leveymg]

54. Is this one of those FEMA post-crisis plans?

[manhunter2006]

5. Works for Me...

Some pretty cool possibilities,,

Mammoth steaks, mammoth burgers...mmmmmmmmm.

[Placebo]

6. Mammoth Burgers. Coming soon to a Fuddruckers near you.

:9

[okoboji]

9. Hairy Elephant Steaks .....

I think I'll pass.

[Sabriel]

19. Yes, but what about Mad Mammoth disease?

Do we really need herds of mad mammoths charging around?

[paparush]

20. Bush has Mad Man-Mouth disease...its pretty nasty.

[RebelOne]

11. Are you posting over at RaptureReady.com?

Someone there posted a reply in your exact words about this story.

[Richard Steele]

14. Tastes like freezerburnt bear.

And, BTW: Welcome to DU!

[xchrom]

7. woo-hoo! oh i hope so!

that would be so cool!

[KittyWampus]

61. Are Mammoths that come from frozen sperm Snowflake Mammoths?

Great emblem of the luddite, Psuedo-Christian GOP'ers!

[krispos42]

8. Oh give me a home, where the mammoths do roam,...

and the deer and tyranosaurs play,
wWere seldom is heard, a discouraging word,
'bout the dangers of old DNA!

[SlavesandBulldozers]

28. lol

bravo

[krispos42]

29. Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week...

Try the manicotti, and don't forget to tip your server!

[Placebo]

45. ...

:rofl:

[Solly Mack]

10. exciting possibilities

[ima_sinnic]

12. oh right--habitat for species not quite extinct yet is disappearing--

so where would these go? there's a reason they went extinct, assumedly they were not adapted to changing conditions--it is insane to think we a-hole human wannabe "gods" can "bring back" anything at all when we can't manage what we were given in abundance. dumb@$$es.

[MUSTANG_2004]

34. Since people may have killed them off, let's make up for it. nt

[DoYouEverWonder]

13. Oh give me a home

Where the woolly mammoths roam....

[Akim]

15. What They Did With These Mammoths in the Czar's Time

It was not uncommon in Czarist Russia to find these frozen mammoths in Siberia. Do you know what they did with them? Well, they weren't studied scientifically. They were shipped frozen in railroad trains to Moscow. Were they put on exhibit there? Well, not quite.

The mammoths were reserved for the Czar's table. Yes, the Russia nobility feasted on them at grand state banquests. The soon-to-be-extinct feasting on the extinct.

[Akim]

24. And BTW, It Tasted Like Horsemeat n/t

[soothsayer]

16. So I guess I'm the only one who saw Jurassic Park?

yipes!

[IDemo]

17. Mammoth: "Where are all the f*%#g GLACIERS?"

[Crayson]

26. And why are all the other mammoths naked ???

.. and have so small teeth?

[krispos42]

31. That will be the polar bears and penguins soon, as well n/t

[theophilus]

18. Great! Just in time for the new Ice Age.....coming soon to a continent

near you!

[Barrett808]

21. Of course, there's no habitat for them...

There's less and less habitat for extant species, let alone extinct species.

[NashVegas]

22. Can We Please Get Science Out of the Procreation Business?

Nature does just fine on its own. Oh brave new world ...

[Akim]

23. Some Couples Need Science to Procreate n/t

[The2ndWheel]

27. Does everyone have to be able to do everything?

Want a kid that bad, adopt one.

[Occulus]

36. A small quibble:

The laws need to addressed regarding adopted children and the identities of their biological parents. As a result of the laws in place when I was born, for example, my biological parents were able to hide their identity and their complete medical history from me. All I have on my family history record is a bunch of meaningless descriptive information (so-and-so was this tall, and was good at these things, etc.); it doesn't contain anything of use to... well, anyone.

Since this was in 1975, long before DNA sequencing was common and screening for genetic diseases was able to be performed, well... I have no clue what diseases my parents' bloodlines are susceptible to. For family history, on doctors' office forms, I have to write 'Unknown- adopted'. Never mind that I can't say why I look the way I do...

I can hire a PI to ferret the information out, but I can't just pick up the phone and give a call to the people who brought me into the world... and I'm not even told anything about them when they're dead. I can't know what they died of (maybe it was a family history of cancer appearing after the age of 30, and it wasn't found out until after I was born), and that worries me a bit.

Personally, I think all that information should be available to every adopted child from the age of 18. No, I don't believe people giving up their child for adoption ought to expect any right for their identity or their medical history to be hidden from the child. It's both a bit cruel and a medical roll of the dice, for the adopted child and any family they may have when they reach adulthood.

I didn't mean to hijack the thread, but it's something most of us simply don't have to think about, which is why the laws are the way they are. I've even heard some people tell me I don't have a right to know who my parents are. It's funny, though- they get the horrors when I turn that around and tell them the same thing...

[pitohui]

39. a powerful motivation to keep abortion safe and available, for sure

obviously i can't give a child up for adoption and take a risk that my privacy would be violated at some unknown time in the future -- and most especially i can't take that risk if i'm a victim of incest, live in an extremely religious or rightwing community etc.

i can see your point of view but would you better off if you were not born at all? because that is the only option a lot of women could even consider if they could be traced back to the child they gave up


if the only choice were adoption under those terms, because abortion was not available, many women would choose to kill themselves, i would have, many others would de facto kill themselves thru dangerous techniques like coat hanger self-induced abortions

i think there's a limit on what we can expect women to sacrifice after they've already made the sacrifice to carry you for 9 months, if she wants to remain unknown and her story and DNA kept unknown, i don't know how it can be right to disrespect that

[mmonk]

71. Sometimes,

we who are inconvenient lives may be of some worth to humanity, you never know. Better off dead? No. That means my wonderful children wouldn't exist.

[mmonk]

70. I was adopted and wish I knew what to expect medically

as well. Medical records could be provided and still the identity withheld.

[Posteritatis]

Yeah, who needs germ theory or amniocentesis? (n/t)

[Akim]

25. The New Neanderthals Are Coming, TOO!

Scientists have also extracted DNA from the teeth of Neanderthals, so it's conceivable that some day it might be possible to breed them as well.

[krispos42]

30. we already have enough neocons...

lmao

[OregonDem]

32. We dont want more republican voters, do we?

n/t

[Auntie Bush]

33. Horrors! The next thing we

know...Republicans will be cloning Republicans by the millions in the basements of Fundamentalist churches

[Akim]

43. And What Makes You Think It's Not Happening Right Now? n/t

[Thor_MN]

56. No... Republicons reproduce by asexual fission...

They just keep increasing in size until they split in two. Problem is, the IQ doesn't increase so with each division, the IQ is cut in half.

[krispos42]

65. That makes a surpising amount of sense... n/t

[Placebo]

44. I hope so.

The republicans are going to need all the help they can get.

[Spearman87]

35. I'm not sure I buy this, LOL

I think you have a pop science writer conflating a few separate scientic realities. DNA could indeed be intact after thousands of years. And sperm could probably be viable after thousands of years IF stored at say liquid nitrogen temperatures, which is what you would do in a modern lab. But viable sperm after 27,000 years at only permafrost temperature? I'd be surprised if biological scientists are saying that is cold enough for long term preservation of biological function. So I wouldn't think they are not going to pull out and reanimate actual sperm. But maybe they can find most of the DNA sequence intact.

[closeupready]

38. Except that

there have been discoveries of dinosaur tissues - from many millions of years ago!

Therefore, if such tissues are able to survive without fossilizing or disintegrating, maybe it's possible that they'll find intact mammoth sperm. Kind of funny, if they do - :D

[Spearman87]

49. Cryogenic effects is an area that fascinates me

I agree with you. I do think we can find intact sperm. Definitely. And maybe I’m drawing a distinction at the wrong place: I think they will be intact, but unviable/unrevivable. The fine cellular structures ought to have signicantly deteriorated at temperatures as “warm” as you find with things frozen in the permafrost. Degradation and chemical processes are slowed way down at such temperatures, no doubt, but even if it is by a factor of 1,000, that’s still the equivalent of them going on for 27 years. By comparison, if you cool sperm or embryos down to liquid nitrogen temperature, processes are slowed down by such a huge factor that you might expect full viability for thousands of years. I could freeze an embryo or sperm and send them along to be revived by my relatives in the 9,000 AD. But it wouldn’t work, I didn’t think, if the temperature was only say 50 degrees below zero. I might need to bow to the opinion of the Japanese scientist quoted since he is a doctor and I’m far from it. He says they might be alive. I sure would like to know how though….I want to hear more about this, and hear it confirmed by other scientists.

PS—I just pulled up a table that shows the relative rates of chemical reactions compared to the rate at room temperature, as you lower the temperature. The time it will take to equal one second of chemical reaction as you go down in temperature (degrees Celsius) is as follows:


37 degrees---1 second

0 degrees---5.2 seconds (A factor of 5)

-60 degrees----3.3 minutes (A factor of close to 200)

-80 degrees (dry ice temperature---17.2 minutes (A factor of 1,032)

-196 degrees ---24.6 million years (liquid nitrogen temperature…..A factor that I will not even ATTEMPT to calculate!)


That is not the entire picture, BTW. Certain processes occur at the quantum level that add a degree of deterioration that low temperature can not prevent. But in any case, even when things are frozen, certain chemical reactions proceed and effect things on the cellular and molecular levels, which is one reason frozen meat is only edible for a limited period of time.

[Ediacara]

59. The dinosaur tissue isn't DNA

It's fairly sturdy bone proteins that were preserved due to desication and low heat.

[SmokingJacket]

37. Hm, there's a reason they went extinct.

Is our earth even remotely suited to them anymore?

Suppose we could keep a few alive in a zoo, though.

[pitohui]

40. people killed them and ate them, that's the reason

i don't know why they wouldn't do okay if people would just knock it off

a bigger concern to me is that the "mammoth" created this way is not the real thing, so it seems a waste to provide ever-vanishing habitat to a fake created species when we have real natural species disappearing literally every day, some say if you include the plants and insects literally several species go extinct each day

[SmokingJacket]

41. Lack of habitat post-ice age probably had a bit to do with it too.

It's hard enough to keep buffalo in Yellowstone --

[Solon]

47. Actually Mammoths mostly ranged from Tundra environments all the way...

to Temperate climates. In today's world, they would probably do just fine in either the US or Canada. Over hunting in addition to sudden climate change lead to their demise.

Though I would say bringing back the Tasmanian wolf or the Dodo bird would be both easier and make a little more sense.

[closeupready]

48. As to the dodo bird, actually,

I believe there are few tissue samples remaining. The Europeans who ate them simply tossed their bones away, and also, Mozambique or Madasgacar (the island where they lived) is a much warmer environment (obviously) than the tundra of Siberia, making DNA degradation more likely.

[Solon]

51. Good point...

The Mammoth is a really good candidate for a resurrection of sorts. Take Male Mammoth sperm, inject it in a Modern Female's egg, she gets pregnant, gives birth to a half Mammoth hybrid. This hybrid will be guaranteed to be female, and when she reaches mating age, she is impregnated with a different Mammoth's sperm, repeat one or more times and you get a full fledged Mammoth, and the possibility to reconstitute the species.

If they get their hands on Dodo DNA, they would have to try to clone it FIRST, from that DNA, make a pair, using some unfertilized Emu eggs or something, and then make sure they can mate successfully. A little more complicated, and expensive, actually.

As far as the Tasmanian Wolf, same procedure as the Dodo, unlike Mammoths, the Tasmanian Wolf doesn't have any closely related living relatives. It was a marsupial, so you can't just insert the sperm into a real Wolf and expect success, talk about complicated.

[Xithras]

50. Heavy reforestation probably had a lot to do with it too.

There were far fewer trees across much of North America and Eurasia during the last ice age, with vast expanses of the semi-frozen grasslands that they were adapted to. When the ice began to recede many of these grasslands turned into marshlands and forests, two environments that they couldn't survive in (dense forest made them easy pickings for predators, and they were too large for marshes). What little remained of the cool grasslands they required was too fragmented to maintain a large population. Early human hunting was simply the final blow against a species that was on its way to extinction anyway. Even if there were no humans on this planet, it is highly unlikely that there would be any mammoth today.

[Solon]

52. I don't know about that...

Think of the vast grasslands that are still around in the Midwest, in addition to the tundra of Canada, environments that Mammoths could live in today. In fact, there are plenty of animals missing in North American ecosystems. For example, there were huge herds of bison in North America, but for many years, only one large predator of them, Humans. Where were the large predators, they died out due to lack of adapting to Human pressures. The same could be said for Mammoths.

[closeupready]

62. Well, don't forget bears and, to a lesser extent, wolves.

They are also predators, and their range was just about the entire lower 48, as well.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

42. 'Scuse me; but where the hell will they live?

Are we going to bring them back so we can stick them in zoos?
We can't manage to maintain enough poacher-free space to maintain herds of elephants and rhinos. How are we going to manage mammoths?

[Placebo]

46. I'm betting Zoos...

which would also help offset the high cost of getting them back in this world.

[AlienGirl]

57. In laboratories, where else?

[Kali]

53. Free enterprise!

They can raise 'em on game ranches in Texas and Dicks like Cheney can shoot 'em for fun.

[Bucky]

55. Wouldn't 50% of a "Mammoth" just be called a "Very Large"?

Excuse me, I mean a Wooly Very Large.

[slackmaster]

64. I'll have a Wolly Venti with three shots of espresso

:hide:

Sorry, couldn't resist.

[Akim]

66. How About a Lite-Mammoth? n/t

[TankLV]

68. maybe "jumbo" or "supersized"?...

[bklyncowgirl]

58. Didn't any of these guys see Jurassic Park?

I'm no scientist but this sounds like a crazy idea.

[truthisfreedom]

67. no thanks, guys. put down the sperm and back away from the Mammoth!

i really don't think we need Woolly Mammoths lumbering around.

[TankLV]

69. "...guys. put down the sperm..."

"...or you'll all go blind again!..."

...time to back away from the computer and find a REAL date!...

[elliswyatt]

72. I'm so excited!!!

I've always wanted to ride a mammoth into war.