Colossal Biosciences may one day be mocked by tabloids as a “COLOSSAL Mistake” after one of their bioengineered sabretooth tigers rampages through Central Park. The last time I wrote about the de-extinction company, they were claiming to have mapped a significant portion of the extinct Tasmanian Tiger’s genome. Their newest announcement is a little more tangible. They played God and created woolly mice—mice with woolly mammoth DNA that makes them fuzzy, adorable abominations.
Genetically speaking, these genetically modified mice are still mice. They just have fur coats that offer a rough idea of what a woolly mammoth’s fur looked like. And apparently, what it looked like was an orange tabby cat after a bath. This delightful genetic freak brings Colossal one step closer to its goal of one day resurrecting the long-extinct woolly mammoth.
Why? Because they can, and because, I guess, not a single one of them has watched Jurassic Park, or has even heard of it, and if you try to bring it up, they plug their ears and hum.
The company’s researchers made these genetic modifications by first identifying genetic variations between extinct woolly mammoths and their closest living relative, the Asian elephant. They narrowed it down to 10 variants, like hair thickness, length, texture, and even body fat, that correspond to DNA variants in lab mice. Then the team got to work making genetic edits to seven mouse genes. If you work in the field of genetics and you want to peer review their work, too bad. So far, Colossal has not published a paper detailing its research, and it has not yet been peer-reviewed.
All of this is a small but important step toward the company’s ultimate goal of re-creating the woolly mammoth. But it won’t do so in the way you’re imagining. It’s not going to exactly be like Jurassic Park where they’re going to toss some DNA into a bunch of laboratory equipment and then out comes a one-to-one re-creation of a Tyrannosaurus rex. By 2028, Colossal wants to create approximations of the woolly mammoth using Asian elephants.
Basically, what they just did by making a mouse look like a hamster will be scaled up to make an elephant look like an extinct elephant. It’s not going to be like they opened the time portal and out walked a woolly mammoth. They’re just creating fucked up-looking Asian elephants — an impressive feat nonetheless.
The company plans to achieve this using a genetically edited Asian elephant embryo and an artificial womb. Despite its progress, Colossal’s work has sparked ethical debates. Some argue that the benefits of re-engineering extinct species, like mammoths, are speculative, and concerns about animal welfare and ecological balance remain unresolved.
Colossal’s long-term goals include resurrecting other extinct species, such as the thylacine (Tasmanian tiger) and the dodo bird, by creating proxy species that can fill ecological niches left vacant after their extinction. However, geneticists like Alison Van Eenennaam caution that while simple traits like hair can be engineered, other aspects, such as behavior, are more complex and may be harder to replicate.
Despite the scientific and ethical challenges, Colossal continues to push forward, with plans to improve artificial womb technology and overcome hurdles in generating bird and marsupial embryos. While the company’s work is far from complete, the woolly mice represent an important milestone in the quest to bring extinct creatures back to life, raising both excitement and skepticism about the future of de-extinction.
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