Name: Scientists Clone Endangered Species - Black-Footed Ferret
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Scientists Clone Endangered Species - Black-Footed Ferret

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For the first time, scientists have created a clone of an endangered U.S. species—a black-footed ferret named Elizabeth Ann. The researchers used cells from a donor that had been dead for more than 30 years, and success could mean not only rescue for one of North America’s most endangered mammals, but in conservation biology.After the donor ferret, Willa, died in 1988, scientists sent her cells to the Frozen Zoo at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance in order to preserve her DNA. Their foresight paid off in November 2020, when Willa’s genes were injected into an embryo, zapped “awake” with a bolt of electricity, and implanted into the uterus of a domestic ferret, who gave birth to Elizabeth Ann on December 10.“Cloning, itself, is actually not cutting-edge,” says Ben Novak, lead scientist at the California-based nonprofit , which led the black-footed ferret project. “What’s really innovative about what we’ve done is that we reached back in time to bring back something that had been lost.” The greatest threat to endangered species like the black-footed ferret is the loss of genetic diversity, Novak says. Genetic variation bolsters a species’ fitness, or its ability to bounce back from environmental stresses like disease, habitat loss, and climate change. Critically, diversity lowers the risk of inbreeding within a species. “Inbreeding creates problems for [an animal’s] fertility, so they end up having fewer offspring, which of course leads to less diversity,” Novak says. Many endangered species don’t see an influx of new genetic material. That’s when genetic rescue—a range of techniques that includes everything from low-tech fixes like introducing new individuals into closed populations, to high-tech solutions like cloning and genetic engineering—can revive these dwindling species. One of the first steps of genetic rescue, though, is to map a species’ genetic information, or genome. Reviving long-dead animals sounds like sci-fi. But advances in genetic engineering could someday allow scientists to resurrect extinct species like the passenger pigeon, little bush moa, and even the woolly mammoth.QuaggaLast Seen: 1883 The South Africa–based Quagga Project is working to revive the extinct quagga, a striped plains zebra subspecies. In 1983, scientists mapped the Quagga’s genome, the first mapped genome of an extinct species.Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger)Last Seen: 1936The Thylacine Cloning Project replicated some Tasmanian tiger DNA in 2002, but couldn’t complete a genetic picture of the animal. In 2017, scientists finally sequenced the species’ entire genome.Woolly MammothLast Seen: 1650 B.C.Revive &amp; Restore believes that by tweaking the genome of the Asian elephant—the closest living relative of the woolly mammoth—they could create a hybridized “mammophant.” But it’s estimated to cost tens of millions of dollars and is reliant on degraded DNA samples.— JL“It’s a cascade of information,” says Oliver Ryder, Ph.D., about the genome. The director of conservation genetics at and head of the Frozen Zoo explains that the order of the genetic information within a species’ genome can dictate things like fur color and resistance to disease, but also reveal an evolutionary phenomenon called a genetic bottleneck—essentially a point where a species’ genetic diversity shrinks. The roughly 400 to 500 black-footed ferrets alive today—except for Elizabeth Ann—are descended from a gene pool of just seven individuals.Clone WarsWith the genome sequenced, scientists can decide which methods of genetic rescue will benefit the species most. The cloning method used to produce Elizabeth Ann won’t work on a reptile or bird, for example, because those types of animals have complicated reproductive strategies and hard-shelled eggs. “Cloning is not the silver bullet to saving endangered species, but it can be a valuable tool, infusing unique genetic material into managed breeding and wild populations,” says Paul Marinari, Ph.D., a senior curator at the , who manages the Species Survival Plan for black-footed ferrets. In the future, Novak’s team hopes to combine reproductive technologies like cloning with genetic engineering. Even though Elizabeth Ann has a separate genetic lineage than all other black-footed ferrets alive today, her genetic material stems from the same population, a group of ferrets once native to Wyoming. Researchers could increase genetic diversity further by mapping the genome of extinct black-footed ferret populations native to another region, say Texas, pinpoint sections of their genetic code with beneficial traits, and then edit those traits into the DNA of future clones.This strengthens the case for the kind of DNA sample collection that scientists performed on Willa in the ’80s. Elizabeth Ann is alive today because Willa’s cells were cryo-preserved years ago. Not all endangered species have any preserved tissue around for scientists to work with.Me Myself and My CloneNovak is hopeful that continued preservation practices will eventually pay off. “People could be going out and saving the that exists in rare species,” he says. A tissue sample the size of a grain of rice could save a species like the California condor or the mountain gorilla from future extinction. Biological samples from insects, birds, and reptiles could prove valuable, too, while we wait for to catch up to the nuances of nature’s various reproductive methods. After all, it was forward thinking that led to Elizabeth Ann’s birth. “There was no technology at the time that could have made those cells into an animal again,” Novak says. “They were banking those with the hope that someday it was coming.”Advertisement - Continue Reading BelowAdvertisement - Continue Reading Below

For the first time, scientists have created a clone of an endangered U.S. species—a black-footed ferret named Elizabeth Ann. The researchers used cells from a donor that had been dead for more than 30 years, and success could mean not only rescue for one of North America’s most endangered mammals, but in conservation biology.After the donor ferret, Willa, died in 1988, scientists sent her cells to the Frozen Zoo at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance in order to preserve her DNA. Their foresight paid off in November 2020, when Willa’s genes were injected into an embryo, zapped “awake” with a...

Scientists Clone Endangered Species - Black-Footed Ferret

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