![]() (Image copyright Mikel Rijsdijk/Dodo Research Programme) Researchers at the Mauritius Island excavation site sieving excavated mud for small bones, teeth and plant remains. “Mauritius was a popular stop because it provided fresh water and lots of food,” Meijer says) (The island’s giant tortoises went extinct in the 1800s when Dutch trade ships filled their holds with these long-lived animals to use as fresh meat on long voyages to and from Indonesia. Considerable resources have been directed to preserving the island’s few remaining endemic species, such as the Mauritian kestrel. Today, Meijer says, the forest cover on Mauritius has been reduced by 98 percent with only a few patches of original forest remaining. It received a reputation as stupid because it did not flee from humans” and human-introduced predators after they arrived at the dodo’s home in the 1600s. “The island had no predators or carnivores and the dodo had no need to flee, so it lost its ability to fly. The dodo was resilient, and perfectly adapted to the island’s habitat, Meijer explains. The excavation site on the island of Mauritius where the remains of some 500,000 animals were found, victims of an extreme drought some 4,000 years ago. “It is evident that a lot of animals suffered and died during this period, and their populations were greatly reduced,” Meijer continues, “but no species, including the dodo, went extinct during this extreme drought.” Fossil evidence reveals that “all animals were still living and the island’s ecosystem was intact at the time humans arrived in the 1600s.” “Dodos, tortoises, lizards and other animals gathered here because the lake was one of the few sites on the island with fresh water,” says Hanneke Meijer, an ornithologist at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and one of the paper’s co-authors. Using radiocarbon dating of the bones, oxygen isotope analysis of geologic features on Mauritius and nearby islands, and the study of the island’s water table, the scientists determined the animals died during an extreme drought that lasted several decades. (Image copyright Kenneth Rijsdijk/Dodo Research Programme) “Preventing species from going extinct in the first place should be our priority, and in most cases, it's a lot cheaper,” said Worm.Dodo bone in a matrix of mud, seed and other fossils excavated in a dry lake bed on the Island of Mauritius. It helps if they can learn from other wild animals of their kind - an advantage that potential dodos and mammoths won't have, said Boris Worm, a biologist at the University of Dalhousie in Halifax, Nova Scotia, who has no connection to Colossal. On a practical level, conservation biologists familiar with captive breeding programs say that it can be tricky for zoo-bred animals to ever adapt to the wild. ![]() “And where on Earth would you put a woolly mammoth, other than in a cage?” asked Pimm, who noted that the ecosystems where mammoths lived disappeared long ago. “There's a real hazard in saying that if we destroy nature, we can just put it back together again - because we can't,” said Duke University ecologist Stuart Pimm, who has no connection to Colossal. Other scientists wonder if it's even advisable to try, and question whether “de-extinction” diverts attention and money away from efforts to save species still on Earth. The concept is still in an early theoretical stage for dodos.īecause animals are a product of both their genetics and their environment - which has changed dramatically since the 1600s - Shapiro said that “it's not possible to recreate a 100% identical copy of something that's gone.” ![]() It may be possible to put the tweaked cells into developing eggs of other birds, such as pigeons or chickens, to create offspring that may in turn naturally produce dodo eggs, said Shapiro. The team may then attempt to edit Nicobar pigeon cells to make them resemble dodo cells. Her team plans to study DNA differences between the Nicobar pigeon and the dodo to understand “what are the genes that really make a dodo a dodo,” she said. Shapiro is paid by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, which also supports The Associated Press’ Health and Science Department. The dodo's closest living relative is the Nicobar pigeon, said Beth Shapiro, a molecular biologist on Colossal's scientific advisory board, who has been studying the dodo for two decades. Fatalities rise to 89 in Maui, making it the deadliest wildfire in modern US history ![]()
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