Extinct Pyrenean Ibex Cloned

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Posted by Soulskill on Sunday February 1, 2009 @05:32AM from the intrepid-endeavor dept.

jamie points out a story in the Telegraph about a project to clone the Pyrenean Ibex (known also as bucardo), a species that went extinct in 2000. Before the last known member of the species died, scientists took tissue samples to begin a project to clone the animal. "Using techniques similar to those used to clone Dolly the sheep, known as nuclear transfer, the researchers were able to transplant DNA from the tissue into eggs taken from domestic goats to create 439 embryos, of which 57 were implanted into surrogate females. " Now, for the first time, one of them has survived the gestation period, living for seven minutes after birth. One of the researchers said, "The delivered kid was genetically identical to the bucardo. In species such as bucardo, cloning is the only possibility to avoid its complete disappearance."

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HUMANS: - by Bananatree3 · 2009-02-01 05:40 · Score: 5, Insightful

The only species with the idiocy and shortsightedness to make a species go extinct, and the only species with the passionate pursuit knowledge to bring them back.
1. Re:HUMANS: - by Anonymous Coward · 2009-02-01 05:47 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  The only species with the idiocy and shortsightedness to make a species go extinct
  Ridiculous. Humans may be better at causing extinctions than other species but that isn't because other species are reluctant to do it, or consider the implications at all.
2. Re:HUMANS: - by Dyinobal · 2009-02-01 06:11 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Survival of the fittest. Humans are how ever the only species likely to cause massive extinctions to an extent it would destablize the ecosystem and cause a huge host of other problems (in a worst case scenario obviously).
3. Re:HUMANS: - by alx5000 · 2009-02-01 06:14 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Yes, and since we have the ability to both consider the implications of and avoid the extinction of other species, we should at least try to be a little worse at it...
  
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4. Re:HUMANS: - by Jack9 · 2009-02-01 06:45 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  "destabilize" is pejorative without qualification. "change" or "influence" is accurate. Perhaps that was not the point you were trying to make. Causing and preventing extinctions are inevitable, amoral events (we damn near exterminate diseases, both animal and human, without much complaint). It's interesting to see how many tree-huggers are on /. Implying that the genetic code of certain fluffy/swimmy organisms, by extension their species, are sancrosanct is disturbingly ignorant. Your Morals May Vary.
  
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5. Re:HUMANS: - by tompaulco · 2009-02-01 08:14 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  If you consider humans to not be a part of nature, then actively preventing extinction would be unnatural. Putting a stop to activities which lead to extinction would be great, but putting together breeding programs and doing other human activities to increase the chances of a species to survive, is unnatural.
  On the other hand, if you consider humans to be a part of nature, we can do whatever we want, for or against a species.
  
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6. Re:HUMANS: - by O('_')O_Bush · 2009-02-01 15:15 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Protecting other species because we feel that it is wrong to kill one off is just ridiculous. If they were strong species, they'd adapt, just like rats, wolves (dogs), and numerous other animals have.
  
  They cannot adapt to the evolutionary pressure caused by us so they must go extinct. Science trying to reverse this process is hypocritical.
  
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How fast are they? by damburger · 2009-02-01 05:43 · Score: 4, Insightful

-We clocked the Pyrenean Ibex at 30mph
-(looking horrified)You cloned a Pyrenean Ibex!?
Somehow, I don't think the Jurassic Park tag is completely accurate...

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clinging to the past by Anonymous Coward · 2009-02-01 05:44 · Score: 2, Insightful

Extiction is a natural part of life. Over time MOST species have gone extinct with very few ancestral lineages leading to the present extant species. There have been many mass extinctions in the past and there is still significant (though different from previously present) diversity. Are we perhaps a little misguided in our attempts to make this world's diversity static?
1. Re:clinging to the past by MutantEnemy · 2009-02-01 06:14 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Oh for God's sake. Just because there have been five major extinction events in the past doesn't mean we should gladly cause a sixth.
  
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2. Re:clinging to the past by Anonymous Coward · 2009-02-01 06:20 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  Sure, the extinction rate is a positive number, and the creation rate too, and have always been. Things get scary when you look at the actual rates, not just their sign.
What? by Dan+East · 2009-02-01 05:46 · Score: 3, Insightful

Wait a second. So these things went extinct just 10 years ago. Wouldn't it have been a lot easier (and cheaper) to, um, keep some of them alive instead of waiting until they died off? So if they do clone them and they live, how are they supposed to survive now when they couldn't survive just a decade ago?

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1. Re:What? by danlip · 2009-02-01 10:42 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Wait a second. So these things went extinct just 10 years ago. Wouldn't it have been a lot easier (and cheaper) to, um, keep some of them alive instead of waiting until they died off? So if they do clone them and they live, how are they supposed to survive now when they couldn't survive just a decade ago?
  It's pretty expensive to try to keep a breeding population of every endangered species alive in captivity (we kill off a huge number every year), and some animals don't breed well in captivity. If they are in the wild you have much less control (it doesn't sound like they had any of these in captivity, according to wiki). And the last one died 9 years ago but the last potential mate may have died much longer ago than that.
  "how are they supposed to survive now" is a good question, but I don't think this effort is really mean to be a practical solution to extinction, but rather a "prove we can" kind of thing.
Nature, red in tooth and claw. by Colin+Smith · 2009-02-01 06:03 · Score: 5, Insightful

The only species with the idiocy and shortsightedness to make a species go extinct,
Completely utterly wrong.
All species end up extinct. They are replaced by others which are more fit for the environment.

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1. Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw. by Aranykai · 2009-02-01 06:27 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Evolve - To move in regular procession through a system.
  Extinct - No longer in existence; having died out.
  How can a regular procession equate to the cessation of existence?
  *burns karma*
  
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2. Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw. by Anonymous Coward · 2009-02-01 06:42 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  They are replaced by others which are more fit for the environment.
  Incorrect. Evolutionary success is often not a matter of superior fitness, but simply not being selected against.
3. Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw. by 10Neon · 2009-02-01 07:39 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Some of them are quite good at it. Raccoons, pigeons, rats, cockroaches, to name a few. Sure, they're not species we particularly like but it is certainly not the case that an urbanized environment is a human-only zone.
  
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4. Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw. by Anonymous Coward · 2009-02-01 07:47 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  Way too much attention is paid to the survival of minor mammalian species. Most of the life on this earth is bacteria and insects. They're not in any danger of extinction because they are much better adapted to changing environmental conditions.
5. Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw. by mrsquid0 · 2009-02-01 08:13 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  >Wrong. Evolution is false.
  Evolution is a mathematical concept that can be applied to physical and biological (and other) systems. Saying that evolution is false is a lot like saying that optimization is false, or that group theory is false.
  
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6. Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw. by phosphorylate+this · 2009-02-01 09:14 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  But they are frequently replaced by minor varients of themselves. We are currently running through the tree-of-life with a chainsaw and destroying entire branches (although not in this case). In terms of species loss humanity obviously has the ability to reach dinasaur-asteroid-killer proportions.
  In terms of sheer infornmation loss that should be considered a disaster. On a more selfish level it also irreversivbly closes potential sources of knowledge and utility that we don't yet know the value of. Consider the Australian aborigines who upon arrival drove all the local potentially domesticatable animals to extinction thus leaving them in a technological rut for 60kyr.
  In terms of the ibex clones, I'm not sure this is a wise use of resoucres. Resources now need to be spent sampling/storing/cataloging all the species still alive as the rate of extinction is so great.
Re:NOT CLONES! NOT CLONES by khallow · 2009-02-01 06:20 · Score: 3, Insightful

Huh, do you actually read the articles you link to?

Reproductive cloning

Reproductive cloning is used to create an animal that has the same DNA as another animal. The famous Dolly the sheep was the first animal created by reproductive cloning. The scientists, using a technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer, transfer genetic material taken from an adult cell nucleus to an egg whose nucleus has been removed. The egg, now containing the adult donor genetic material is then treated with chemicals or an electric current to trigger cell division. When the cloned embryo reaches a certain stage, it is transplanted to the uterus of a female of the same species where the pregnancy continues hopefully as normal.

Dolly and other animals created using nuclear transfer technology are not true identical clones. Only the clone's chromosomal DNA is the same as the donor's DNA. There is also genetic material in the mitochondria, which reside in the cytoplasm of the egg cell that had its nucleus removed. The mitochondrial DNA is also replicated as the cell divides and this mitochondrial DNA will be from the animal that donated the egg cell and not from the donor animal.
Sure, I see the "not true identical clones" in there. I also see that they call it "cloning". The adjective doesn't change that it is cloning. Claiming that it's not a clone? Basing that on a few minute changes in mitochrondial DNA? That's just wrong not pedantic. After all, there'll be transcription errors in the clone anyway. The mitochondrial changes are in my view of that order.
What's the point? by macraig · 2009-02-01 06:44 · Score: 4, Insightful

What's the point of reviving this species of Ibex, unless we also remove the conditions that caused it to go extinct in the first place? I'm guessing that condition is known by the name Homo sapiens?
It's guilt and sentimentalism driving this behavior, not pragmatism. Does anyone recall the movie "Silent Running"? We're continuing to motor headlong toward that consequence and not making the pragmatic changes necessary to avert it.
To hell with fighting global warming or terrorism: we need to be reversing human overpopulation, NOW, before Mother Nature finally finds a way to do it for us. Cloning a few members of this Ibex species is a waste of effort when the PROBLEM still exists and is GROWING. Are we going to put these Ibex in a space ark and fly them out to Jupiter?
Re:Inbred sheep by PieSquared · 2009-02-01 07:00 · Score: 3, Insightful

Wrong. The only reason inbreeding causes genetic issues is because recessive traits become far more likely to crop up twice then in the general population. If you pick an individual who doesn't have any negative recessive genetic traits, there's no problem... *or* if you genetically tweak the DNA before you go about the procedure to remove those genetic traits you don't want to show up.
Of course the genetic manipulation required to do this on an animal who's species is already extinct is extremely difficult if not impossible with modern techniques... but so is producing a truly viable clone of an extinct species in the first place (one that lives a full life, not 7 minutes, or even the half-life we found cloned sheep got).

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Where the hell did I "nature"? by Bananatree3 · 2009-02-01 07:47 · Score: 1, Insightful

*Humans* are the only species that actively exterminate other species on a massive scale

Mother nature is not a "species". I was talking specifically about "species" in my original post.

I simply stated that humans are in a unique position - we can and do actively exterminate species, and we also actively bring species back. NO other living thing on the planet has that kind of ability.
Re:I love your idea by justinlee37 · 2009-02-01 08:18 · Score: 2, Insightful

Reducing the population != killing people. All you have to do is reduce the birth rate. VHEMT.org