By Thomas Claburn
InformationWeek
November 19, 2008 06:20 PM
Just in time for global warming, scientists have sequenced the genome of the
extinct woolly mammoth, last seen roaming the Earth about 10,000 years ago and
in cudgel-and-sandals films like 10,000 BC.
"Previous studies on extinct organisms have generated only small amounts of
data," said Stephan C. Schuster, the Penn State University biochemistry
professor who co-authored the new research, in a statement. "Our data set is
100 times more extensive than any other published data set for an extinct
species, demonstrating that ancient DNA studies can be brought up to the same
level as modern genome projects."
Schuster told The Associated Press that eventually it should be possible to
re-create any extinct creature that lived within the last 100,000 years, given
suitable genetic material.
That appears to preclude the sort of dinosaur theme park depicted in the film
Jurassic Park -- the Jurassic period spanned from about 206 million to 144
million years ago.
However, Pleistocene Park has potential -- think saber-toothed tigers, giant
ground sloths, and Neanderthal tour guides.
"[B]y deciphering this genome we could, in theory, generate data that one day
may help other researchers to bring the woolly mammoth back to life by
inserting the uniquely mammoth DNA sequences into the genome of the modern-day
elephant," Schuster said in a statement. "This would allow scientists to
retrieve the genetic information that was believed to have been lost when the
mammoth died out, as well as to bring back an extinct species that modern
humans have missed meeting by only a few thousand years."
For ancient humans, meeting a woolly mammoth may have been a real treat:
According to the Mammoth Genome Project, "the enormous amount of meat coming
from a six- to eight-ton animal ... would have fed 400 people for several
weeks."
The natural refrigeration available when mammoth was "what's for dinner" may
have made it possible to keep mammoth meat fresh for several weeks.
Unfortunately, experiments suggest chilled mammoth meat probably smelled and
tasted like Limburger cheese. Of course, hygiene standards, not to mention
dietary options, were different then.
Before any of this happens, however the researchers -- from Penn State, the
Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, the Zoological Institute in
Russia, the University of California, the Broad Institute, Roche Diagnostics,
and the Sperling Foundation -- have further work to do.
The genome data set now consists of 4 billion DNA bases, but Schuster and his
colleagues believe that only 3.3 billion of them belong in the mammoth genome.
The extra DNA bases could belong to bacteria, fungi, or something else that
might have contaminated the genetic sample, comprised of hairs from a frozen
mammoth recovered from the Siberian permafrost.
So the scientists have to clean up their genomic data. If and when tomorrow's
aspiring P.T. Barnum decides to revive the species for science or showmanship,
he won't want his woolly mammoth to have, say, a mushroom for a head.
To help arrive at a functional woolly mammoth genome, the researchers at the
Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard are sequencing the genome of the African
elephant for comparison.
"Only after the genome of the African elephant has been completed will we be
able to make a final assessment about how much of the full woolly-mammoth
genome we have sequenced," said Webb Miller, a professor of biology, computer
science, and engineering at Penn State, in a statement.
This work, however, awaits further funding.
