
The first pictures of blood from a 10,000 year old Siberian woolly mammoth - phowat
http://siberiantimes.com/science/casestudy/news/exclusive-the-first-pictures-of-blood-from-a-10000-year-old-siberian-woolly-mammoth/
======
endtwist
The most interesting part of that article is the non-chalant last line: "Once
the [wooly mammoth's] tissues have been treated to a nuclear transfer process,
the eggs will be implanted into the womb of a live elephant for a 22-month
pregnancy."

Cloning wooly mammoths! Now that is cool.

~~~
uvdiv
The line before that is even more interesting:

 _Stem cell scientist Hwang Woo-suk's private bioengineering laboratory
confirmed he is poised to make a bid to return the extinct Siberian mammoth to
the planet._

Hwang Woo-suk is an extremely famous scientific _fraud_.

[http://www.time.com/time/covers/asia/0,16641,20060109,00.htm...](http://www.time.com/time/covers/asia/0,16641,20060109,00.html)

<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/world/asia/27clone.html>

<http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2006/11/28-01.html>

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hwang_Woo-suk>

 _SEOUL, South Korea — Hwang Woo-suk, a disgraced cloning expert from South
Korea who had claimed major breakthroughs in stem-cell research, was convicted
Monday of falsifying his papers and embezzling government research funds. A
judge sentenced him to a suspended two-year prison term, saying Dr. Hwang had
shown remorse and had not taken research money for personal use._

 _Dr. Hwang was once hailed as a national hero in the South. His school, Seoul
National University, disowned him in 2005, saying that he had fabricated the
papers he had published to global acclaim._

~~~
ChuckMcM
One wonders though, his research was shown to be fraudulent but is his skill
fraudulent? I mean guy the might be an excellent cell biologist that tried to
short cut his way to fame and got caught, or he might be a complete fraud and
not even be a passable biologist. Trying to find stuff about the man is
difficult through all the articles about his downfall.

~~~
uvdiv
_or he might be a complete fraud and not even be a passable biologist_

He's genuinely one of the top researchers in the field (see: cloned dog).

~~~
ignostic
The first cloned dog, in fact.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snuppy>

------
loupeabody
I'm a little but confused by the nature of how further
research/experimentation will proceed. Namely why the _rights_ to clone were
_sold_ after the discovery.

Presumably, given how radical this discovery is, the opportunity to clone an
extinct species would be given to the most capable scientific institution on
the planet, not for the highest bidder... Maybe the South Koreans qualify as
the most capable, I don't really know. Or perhaps my vision of the
international science community is just naive.

~~~
bionsuba
They were sold because that body belonged to someone (or some group) due to it
being on their property. One cannot just go on somebody's property and take
whatever they find and give it to anyone else in the name of "scientific
discovery".

~~~
loupeabody
No, I get that, sorry if I didn't make my understanding clear. I had just
previously assumed that discoveries of this magnitude are treated with a
degree of import that supersedes commercial interest. I don't find it
unethical or anything like that. As you say, it's their property.

After reading this [0], found from an above comment, it's clear that cloning
endeavors are generally private initiatives. In my mind, this discovery was
similar to unearthing ruins or something, but nothing's sacred [1].

[0] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrenean_ibex#Cloning_project> [1]
[http://www.peruthisweek.com/news-3743-peru-heavy-
machinery-d...](http://www.peruthisweek.com/news-3743-peru-heavy-machinery-
destroys-nazca-lines/)

------
coldcode
How many clones of different DNA would you need to produce a viable herd?
Otherwise wooly mammoth coats and steaks will be really expensive.

~~~
lettergram
They should be able to simply basically guess and check with the DNA, making
small manipulations and seeing if it is enough to produce a viable herd.

Also inbreeding might work itself to produce a viable herd.

~~~
Scriptor
It's much more difficult than that. The biggest issue is finding where exactly
to make the changes. Even then, we don't necessarily know what the phenotype,
the eventual outcome, of making a change will be.

There are two versions of each gene (because there are two of each
chromosome), what often happens is that even if one version of the gene is
defective, the other version is enough to compensate.

Now, say you have two individuals, each one has one working and one defective
version of a gene. If you cross those individuals 25% of the offspring will
have two copies of the "good" version, 50% will have one good and one
defective copy, and 25% will be unlucky and have two versions of the defective
version. This is just regular Mendelian genetics so you might have heard all
this before. However, it sets up why crossing two clones can be risky.

So, in the above example 75% of offspring will be fine. Sounds pretty good,
right? But that's only when considering one gene. A mammoth likely has tens of
thousands of genes. This particular one can be carrying any number of
defective versions of each of those genes. Crossing it with an exact genetic
copy would mean that the risk of having an offspring with a genetic defect is
that much higher.

However, it might not be all that bad. Entire viable populations have likely
descended from something like a pregnant female floating on a raft to a new
island. If they can extract blood from even one other mammoth, that might be
just enough to create healthy enough offspring. The main barrier is the
gestation time and generation time. Two fertile rats stranded on an island
with plenty of food can reproduce fast enough to quickly create a good
population that might be able to overcome low genetic diversity through sheer
numbers. Trying to raise enough mammoths will be much more expensive and much
more time-consuming.

~~~
BoppreH
Isn't the lack of an opposite gender DNA a problem?

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davidw
Wow, that would be so cool - imaging going to the zoo to see one, something
people 20 years ago had absolutely no hope of doing.

~~~
kolinko
well, there was this guy who made a movie on the subject...

~~~
Symmetry
Thankfully, unlike with dinosaurs we know that humans are quite capable of
hunting mammoths to extinction if we want to.

~~~
jff
I have absolutely no doubt that humans could effectively eliminate a wild
dinosaur population in short order. Think of the trophy mounts!

~~~
encoderer
Hear, Hear. If there's one thing we humans are good at, it's genocide and
slaughter.

~~~
jff
Well, you don't rise to the top of the food chain unless you're able to kill
every other animal out there.

Hail to the king, baby.

------
uptown
Anybody know if the DNA structure of species that are approaching extinction
being preserved for possible regeneration at some point in the future?

~~~
rocky1138
I'm not certain, but they're probably stored in that facility in northern
Norway, Svalbard: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svalbard_Global_Seed_Vault>

------
marcosscriven
I'm not sure if this is fair, but it strikes me as somewhat slapdash to take a
sample right there in the field. Also, while there is red liquid, what's the
chances it contains actual viable DNA, rather than what amount to DNA
fragments and a bit of haemoglobin?

~~~
mapt
With modern sequencing, are a large quantity of 'DNA fragments' sufficient for
full nuclear genome replication?

edit: Make that two questions: one for 'full nuclear genome replication' and
one for 'full nuclear genome sequencing'.

~~~
mapt
So how about for replication?

Have we developed the tech to go from mammal -> digital genome sequence ->
physical replicated chromosome -> egg implanted with chromosome ->
developmentally normal mammal -> fertile offspring, yet, or is that somewhere
in the future?

~~~
jamesjporter
No. That chain ends at the second step "digital genome sequence". In
principle, we could synthesize a bunch of DNA strands corresponding to the
genomic sequences and ligate them all together (although it would be absurdly
expensive and laborious), but this would not constitute a chromosome.
Eukaryotic chromosomes are organized in the nucleus by a huge variety of
scaffolding and modifying factors (histones, etc.) into structures called
chromatin. Recapturing this from sequence data is impossible, even in
principle; the information is just not there. Indeed, understanding nuclear
organization at a bunch of different leves is one of the big challenges of
modern genetic research.

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lettergram
The chances of finding a strand of DNA for replication in that is next to
none...

But i'll keep my fingers crossed

------
wam
Audio of Stewart Brand's recent Long Now Foundation talk about reviving
extinct species:

[http://longnow.org/seminars/02013/may/21/reviving-extinct-
sp...](http://longnow.org/seminars/02013/may/21/reviving-extinct-species/)

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circa
when does Jurassic Park: Woolly Mammoth 3D come out now?

~~~
andalf
What if the electricity goes out in the park?!

~~~
stephengillie
That's why we put it on an island.

~~~
waldrews
Elephants can swim. Like, really well.

~~~
jonahx
They use their trunks as snorkels

