“Colossal Biosciences, the biotech company aiming to bring back extinct species, has set its sights on the Moa: a giant flightless bird from New Zealand devoured by Maori hunters 600 years ago,” reports The Doomslayer.
Genetic engineering startup Colossal Biosciences has added the South Island giant moa — a powerful, long-necked species that stood 10 feet (3 meters) tall and may have kicked in self-defense — to a fast-expanding list of animals it wants to resurrect by genetically modifying their closest living relatives.
The company stirred widespread excitement, as well as controversy, when it announced the birth of what it described as three dire wolf pups in April. Colossal scientists said they had resurrected the canine predator last seen 10,000 years ago by using ancient DNA, cloning and gene-editing technology to alter the genetic make-up of the gray wolf, in a process the company calls de-extinction. Similar efforts to bring back the woolly mammoth, the dodo and the thylacine, better known as the Tasmanian tiger, are also underway.
To restore the moa, Colossal Biosciences announced Tuesday it would collaborate with New Zealand’s Ngāi Tahu Research Centre, an institution based at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand, that was founded to support the Ngāi Tahu, the main Māori tribe of the southern region of New Zealand.
The project would initially involve recovering and analyzing ancient DNA from nine moa species to understand how the giant moa (Dinornis robustus) differed from living and extinct relatives in order to decode its unique genetic makeup, according to a company statement.
Scientists have created a woolly mouse while working to recreate the extinct woolly mammoth.
A genetically-modified chicken lays eggs that people allergic to eggs can eat. Scientists have genetically engineered a cow that produces human insulin in its milk.
Genetic engineering recently produced pork that people who are allergic to pork can eat.
It also has restored vision in some people with inherited blindness.
An English toddler has had her hearing restored in a pioneering gene therapy trial.
