Berkeley Scientists Plan To 'Jurassic Park' Some Extinct Pigeons Back To Life 209
phenopticon writes "Researchers at Berkeley are attempting to revive the extinct passenger pigeon in order to set up a remote island theme park full of resurrected semi-modern extinct animals. (Well, maybe not that last part.) Quoting: 'About 1,500 passenger pigeons inhabit museum collections. They are all that's left of a species once perceived as a limitless resource. The birds were shipped in boxcars by the tons, sold as meat for 31 cents per dozen, and plucked for mattress feathers. But in a mere 25 years, the population shrank from billions to thousands as commercial hunters decimated nesting flocks. Martha, the last living bird, took her place under museum glass in 1914. ... Ben Novak doesn't believe the story should end there. The 26-year-old genetics student is convinced that new technology can bring the passenger pigeon back to life. "This whole idea that extinction is forever is just nonsense," he says. Novak spent the last five years working to decipher the bird's genes, and now he has put his graduate studies on hold to pursue a goal he'd once described in a junior high school fair presentation: de-extinction. ... Using next-generation sequencing, scientists identified the passenger pigeon's closest living relative: Patagioenas fasciata, the ubiquitous band-tailed pigeon of the American west. This was an important step. The short, mangled DNA fragments from the museums' passenger pigeons don't overlap enough for a computer to reassemble them, but the modern band-tailed pigeon genome could serve as a scaffold. Mapping passenger pigeon fragments onto the band-tailed sequence would suggest their original order."
Re:what could go wrong? (Score:5, Insightful)
While I'd like to restore an extinct species, this sort of thing is outright irresponsible.
As irresponsible as wiping them out without thinking of the ramifications?
That's how you do it (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, we could have started with saber-tooth tigers. But no, we don't.
Because this isn't a movie, and we aren't pretending to be idiots just to move a plot along.
Re:Time frame (Score:5, Insightful)
The last Pyrenean ibex (also called a bucardo) died in 2000
...yet there's a media panic if the supply of Twinkies looks like it's in danger.
Priorities, people.
Is it a good thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
More FrankenBird than Un-extinction (Score:4, Insightful)
The short, mangled DNA fragments from the museums' passenger pigeons don't overlap enough for a computer to reassemble them, but the modern band-tailed pigeon genome could serve as a scaffold. Mapping passenger pigeon fragments onto the band-tailed sequence would suggest their original order."
Not quite the original, so not exactly a de-extinction. More of a new breed of Frankenbird.
Re:what could go wrong? (Score:4, Insightful)
Are its natural predators still around
Well the one that made it an extinct species in less than 25 years is. We're also more prevalent than ever and could probably do it more efficiently now too.
or will the passenger pigeon take over and push out other species (not to mention causing crop and tree damage)?
Unless they are much different than current pigeons, I think bridges and building are in more danger.
Re:That's how you do it (Score:4, Insightful)
Idiots don't move the plot, the "hubris" of not considering absurd coincidences and bullshit science move the plot.
Crichton hated environmentalists, but he promoted more magic thinking and anti-science rhetoric than all the worst tree huggers combined.
Re:what could go wrong? (Score:1, Insightful)
While I'd like to restore an extinct species, this sort of thing is outright irresponsible.
So is a luddite knee-jerk reaction to everything related to the phrase genetically modified.
Re:And after the pigeons get loose and take over.. (Score:4, Insightful)
No problem. What're they going to do, lame you to death?
No, they'll repopulate, and bury the planet in their droppings...
Maybe they will repopulate North America, and in the process apply pressure to reduce numbers of imported, invasive pigeons.