Return Engagement

By Gordon Hopkins After 12,500 years, the dire wolf has returned.Sort of. The dire wolf was a species of wolf about twice the size of the modern gray wolf that roamed the Americas for about 100,000 before going extinct. Now, scientists at a biotech company with the not-at-all sinister name of Colossal claim to have resurrected the long-extinct critters.Those scientists have produced three dire wolf puppies that, I admit, are ridiculously cute and fluffy. This was clearly a brilliant marketing move. While some online skeptics are making the inevitable “Jurassic Park” arguments, it is hard for the fear mongers to overcome the awwww-how-cute factor of a white, floofy pup. I doubt the marketing strategy would have been quite as strong if they were showing off a baby Tyrannosaurus. That marketing is a major force behind this de-extinction program is clear by the choice of dire wolves as the first beast to be resurrected, given that most people only know what a dire wolf is thanks to the TV show, “Game of Thrones.” But the big question is, how did they do it? As explained to me by those with bigger brains than mine, those scientists “edited” the genes of grey wolves to include traits from dire wolves.That raises the next big question. Are these really dire wolves?Scientists use a gene-editing technology called CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) to genetically modify cells from a living gray wolf. The modified cells were used to create embryos that were implanted into a surrogate mother, a domestic dog, according to the Associated Press reported. “When Colossal successfully edited 20 carefully chosen genetic variants into grey wolf DNA – 15 of them extinct variants that haven’t existed for over 12,000 years – we were attempting to resurrect key features tied to the functional essence of an extinct species,” said the company's Chief Science Officer Beth Shapiro. That seems to suggest the answer is both yes and no, but mostly no. It seems scientists have basically created a new species rather than resurrecting an extinct one. It is a notable accomplishment on its own but it seems, these days, scientific accomplishments are meaningless without a pop culture reference attached. Imagine if you will that your favorite band from many years ago has announced a reunion tour. How exciting! But are you still excited when you find out the drummer, guitarist and lead singer have all been replaced? Is it still the same band? Can you still rock out to a close approximation of your favorite band? Would you still want to rock out to that band's music if they admitted they were the same band themselves something else?These are not rhetorical questions, by the way. I'm really asking 'cuz I don't know the answers.

Robert “Bob” Lee Brueggemann

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