From glowing rabbits and hypoallergenic cats to Ice Age predators and unicorns, a new class of startups is using genetic modification to reshape the animal kingdom.
Their tools differ, but their goal is the same: to turn biological processes into something that’s programmable.
In Dallas, Colossal Biosciences has achieved what once sounded like science fiction: the birth of three genetically engineered dire wolf pups, brought back from extinction using DNA found in ancient fossils.
Dire wolves (Canis dirus) last roamed the American plains more than 9,500 years ago with woolly mammoths and saber-toothed tigers.
They were depicted as massive carnivores in HBO’s sword-and-sorcery series “Game of Thrones.” (“A Game of Thrones” author George R.R. Martin is a Colossal Biosciences backer, along with “The Lord of the Rings” director Peter Jackson.) But the dire wolves engineered by Colossal are more moderately sized, like the modern Canis lupus.
The biotechnology firm, which is valued at more than $10 billion, announced in April that 6-month-old Romulus and Remus and 2-month-old Khaleesi (named after a “Game of Thrones” character) were born via a combination of gene editing and cloning. Domesticated canines served as incubators.
Meanwhile in Austin, Texas, the Los Angeles Project is preparing to debut fluorescent pet bunnies — genetically engineered using a jellyfish gene that causes them to glow under UV light.
The company, co-founded by biohacker Josie Zayner and biotech entrepreneur Cathy Tie, uses CRISPR, a gene-editing tool that acts like molecular scissors, to insert the jellyfish’s bioluminescence gene.
Glow-in-the-dark rabbits are only the beginning: The bio-engineering firm is planning to produce cats that don’t trigger allergies, jackalopes, dragons and unicorns.
“As a human species, it’s kind of our moral prerogative to level up animals,” Ms. Zayner told Wired magazine.
Colossal also used CRISPR to recreate the dire wolves, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Scientists extracted endothelial progenitor cells (which line blood vessels) from living gray wolves, then edited 14 genes in the cells’ nuclei to match ancient dire wolf DNA, Time reports.
Those edits coded for distinct traits like massive size, white fur, wide jaws and deep howls.
“Our team took DNA from a 13,000-year-old tooth and a 72,000-year-old skull and made healthy dire wolf puppies,” said CEO Ben Lamm in a press release, calling the feat “indistinguishable from magic.”
The altered cell nuclei were implanted into gray wolf eggs, which developed into embryos and were carried to term by domestic hound mixes. All three pups were born healthy via planned cesarean sections.
Colossal’s mission is rooted in conservation and so-called de-extinction. The company also aims to bring back the woolly mammoth in 2028 by rewriting elephant DNA, having already produced 38 “woolly mice” to test gene expression.
But Colossal and the Los Angeles Project could be walking an ethical tightrope.
“There’s a risk of side effects that are severe,” Columbia University bioethicist Robert Klitzman in a Time interview warned of the dire wolf project, noting that gene edits can have unintended effects and cloning is rife with complications.
Bioethicists note that cloned animals often suffer from defects, miscarriages are common and new species can quickly become invasive, wiping out native wildlife. There would be “a lot of suffering involved in that,” Mr. Klitzman told The Daily Beast.
Some fear that resurrecting extinct animals means placing them in a world that evolution has not prepared them for. For example, dire wolves that were accustomed to endless wilderness might experience something akin to captivity in a protected reserve, bioethicists say. And the wooly mammoths of the Ice Age would be reborn in a much warmer environment than the one in which they evolved.
One Instagram user lambasted the Los Angeles Project’s goals.
“As a long-time bunny caretaker and rescuer … WTF is wrong with you both??? Rabbits are in the top 3 of abandoned dumped animals in the united states and even more so around the world, and next to rats being the top abused animals in labs,” the user posted on the startup’s Instagram page. “How can you call yourselves animal lovers [and do] crap like this? Nothing here benefits the animal in any way and is purely aesthetics for more of an excuse to treat animals like objects.”
Still, the pace of progress is hard to ignore. The Los Angeles Project, which has operated mostly in stealth mode, plans to sell its glowing bunnies commercially.
The Washington Times has reached out to The Los Angeles Project to find out if the glowing bunnies have been born.
Colossal’s Mr. Lamm told podcast Joe Rogan on Monday that his biohacking business is proof of humanity’s status as Earth’s “apex predator.”
“We inject our curiosity in choices every day,” he said. “Every time we cut down the rainforest, every time we drink hydrogenated water, we are playing God on some level. We humans are very good at changing the natural flow of things.”
The Los Angeles Project’s co-founder agrees.
“Big ideas take a long time,” Ms. Tie told Vice. “But you have to build the future you want.”
