Extinct Pyrenean Ibex Cloned

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."

Comments

HUMANS: -

[Bananatree3]

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.

Re:HUMANS: -

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:HUMANS: -

[alx5000]

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...

Nature, red in tooth and claw.

[Colin Smith]

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.
 

Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw.

[10Neon]

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.

Re:Nature, red in tooth and claw.

[mrsquid0]

>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.