https://phys.org/news/2025-04-resurrect-extinct-animals-tech-lookalikes.ampQuote
But as the science advances, a deeper question lingers: how close must the result be to count as a true return? If we can only recover fragments of an extinct creature's genome—and must build the rest with modern substitutes—is that really de-extinction, or are we simply creating lookalikes?
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To the public, de-extinction often evokes images of Jurassic Park-style resurrection: a recreation of a lost animal, reborn into the modern world. In scientific circles, however, the term encompasses a variety of techniques: selective breeding, cloning, and increasingly, synthetic biology through genome editing. Synthetic biology is a field that involves redesigning systems found in nature.
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In each case, the company relies on a partial blueprint: incomplete ancient DNA, and then uses the powerful genome editing tool Crispr to edit specific differences into the genome of a closely related living species. The finished animals, if born, may resemble their extinct counterparts in outward appearance and some behavior—but they will not be genetically identical. Rather, they will be hybrids, mosaics or functional stand-ins.
That doesn't negate the value of these projects. In fact, it might be time to update our expectations. If the goal is to restore ecological roles, not to perfectly recreate extinct genomes, then these animals may still serve important functions. But it also means we must be precise in our language. These are synthetic creations, not true returns.
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Unlike the mammoth or the thylacine, the northern white rhino still has living representatives and preserved cells. That makes it a fundamentally different case—more conservation biology than synthetic biology. But it shows the potential of this technology when deployed toward preservation, not reconstruction.
Gene editing also holds promise for helping endangered species by using it to introduce genetic diversity into a population, eliminate harmful mutations from species or enhance resilience to disease or climate change. In this sense, the tools of de-extinction may ultimately serve to prevent extinctions, rather than reverse them.