Genetic engineering has its problems, say scientists
I spent three months working to get this story published during my time at CBC Kids News. Because the science was complex and not yet peer-reviewed, the piece was pulled twice before finally going live.
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Through the experience of pitching and co-producing this article, I was honoured to receive the RTDNA David Suzuki CBC Scholarship, which awarded me $5,000 toward my student loans.
A big thank you to Taylor Katzel for the incredible support throughout the process!
⭐️HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW⭐️
- A company is trying to recreate long-extinct animals.
- In recent months, they’ve created woolly mammoth-like mice and grey wolf pups with dire wolf traits.
- However, some say their claims of de-extinction are false advertising.
- Read on to find out some of the other ethical concerns. ⬇️⬇️⬇️
Unfortunately for fans of Game of Thrones and the Ice Age movies, creatures like dire wolves and woolly mammoths are extinct, possibly forever.
But one company is trying to bring them back … sort of.
On April 7, U.S. tech company Colossal Biosciences announced it was able to “de-extinct” dire wolves, just a month after announcing it had created woolly mammoth-like mice.
Though some say the science could help animal conservation efforts, others say the claim of de-extinction is misleading. Experts have also raised ethical issues with the project.
‘Bringing back’ extinct animals
Dire wolves and woolly mammoths have been extinct for thousands of years.
Cold-loving woolly mammoths, represented here by a model at the American Museum of Natural History, were known to resemble modern elephants with massive tusks and long, thick hair. (Image credit: Bebeto Matthews/The Associated Press)
Back in 2021, Colossal Biosciences announced its ambitious plans to “revive” the long-lost mammoth as part of a larger project to bring back extinct animals.
But instead of reviving these animals in their exact form, the company is taking a different route.
It’s altering the DNA from still-living species — like the grey wolf, a close relative of the dire wolf — to give them the traits of those long-extinct species.
The goal is to create the closest possible alternative.
DNA and genetic engineering
DNA is the name for complex molecules in all living organisms that hold the blueprints of how organisms develop throughout their lives.
Every human being — excluding identical twins — is born with unique DNA that determines their hair colour, height and many other traits. DNA even plays a role in shaping our personalities.
Genetic engineering is the process of purposefully altering the characteristics of a living thing by changing its DNA.
More specifically, the changes are made to things called genes, which are the individual segments that make up the larger DNA molecule.
Genetic engineering isn’t uncommon in our society. For example, many fruits — like bananas — have been genetically engineered to make them more resistant to disease.
The ethics of genetic engineering are more complex when it comes to animals, and laws vary across countries. Canada, for example, has strict laws around genetic engineering when it comes to human embryos.
How the studies worked
Scientists in the past were able to identify which genes in mice were responsible for traits woolly mammoths are known for, like their hair texture.
Colossal Biosciences took that research and used it to genetically engineer the DNA of mice to edit those traits, aiming to make their fur more like the long, shaggy hair of a woolly mammoth.
A genetically engineered woolly mouse, left, next to the original. (Image credit: Colossal Biosciences/The Associated Press)
They took a similar approach to the dire wolf project.
The genes of grey wolves were edited to make them larger — closer to what we think a dire wolf’s size would be — and to give them the white coats that dire wolves were known for.
Why are these studies causing a buzz?
This isn’t the first time a version of woolly mice has been created successfully.
However, according to Ian Dworkin, a geneticist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, the study’s breakthrough comes from the number of genes the scientists were able to successfully change.
“To put it simply, it’s uncommon to end up with a healthy living organism with all its intended traits when making many specific gene edits at the same time,” he told CBC Kids News.
“The woolly mice have seven genes edited and all their intended woolly traits.” .
Romulus and Remus are two of the dire wolf-like pups Colossal Biosciences created, pictured here at three months old. (Image credit: Colossal Biosciences/The Associated Press)
The wolves underwent a similar genetic editing process in which 20 edits in 14 genes were made to make the grey wolf more like a dire wolf.
“They seem to be closer to dire wolves than anything else anybody’s seen for 13,000 years, and that’s pretty cool,” Hank Greely, director of Stanford University’s Center for Law and the Biosciences, told CBC News.
‘De-extinction’ is misleading, some say
Although Colossal Biosciences is claiming it’s restored a lost species with the dire wolf, and that the project is a successful example of de-extinction, some scientists are saying that’s false advertising.
“I do think that it is important for people to remember that these are not dire wolves. There are grey wolves that have some dire wolf characteristics,” Greely said.
Françoise Baylis, a bioethicist at Dalhousie University in Halifax, agreed.
“Colossal Biosciences isn’t bringing back exact copies of extinct species; they are creating modified animals that share a resemblance and are genetically similar,” Baylis told CBC Kids News.
Scientists have ethical concerns
Colossal Biosciences’ research is privately funded, and it didn’t go through something called a peer-review process.
A peer review is when scientists who weren’t involved in the research evaluate it and give their opinion on it before it’s published. For most science funded by public institutions, like governments or universities, peer review is mandatory.
There are ethical concerns that come with engineering, including the health issues animals can develop from gene editing. Some also say it can deter from conservation efforts. (Image credit: Bebeto Matthews/The Associated Press)
This scrutiny can help weed out flawed science that is poor in its research methods or problematic in other ways.
“I want to see some peer-reviewed papers coming out of this, to get a better sense of what actually was done and what’s known and what’s not done,” said Greely.
In the case of genetic engineering, the peer-review process could be important because there are a number of ethical concerns.
For example, editing genes could harm the animals involved.
“Will there be health issues? Can there be disease issues the more you edit the animal?” said Gabriela Mastromonaco, Toronto Zoo’s senior director of wildlife science, to CBC News.
That being said, Colossal Biosciences CEO Ben Lamm said they have been taking precautions.
“We’re being extremely careful about what [genes] we’re picking so that we know that when we end up with an animal that it’s healthy,” he told CBC.
Another ethical concern is how science like this could affect animal conservation efforts.
Colossal Biosciences chief science officer Beth Shapiro said this type of science could inspire new technology that could help conservation efforts.
“There is human ingenuity out there that we can apply to help protect species, to slow the rate of biodiversity loss and potentially reverse it,” she told CBC News.
But some say it could do the opposite.
“It kind of feeds this belief that technology is going to save us from all the mistakes we’ve made in messing up the planet,” said Dave Coltman, a biology professor at Western University in London, Ontario.
“That we shouldn’t worry about extinction because we can always go back and recreate those animals.”
What’s next?
Colossal Biosciences CEO Ben Lamm said they want to continue to push the envelope and develop even closer matches to the animals it’s trying to recreate.
If they can get approved, he said their next step might possibly be to edit the genes of Asian elephants, the woolly mammoth’s closest living relative.
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