After years of working to bring back the dodo, one of the most popular extinct animals, Colossal Biosciences has found a home for the dodo in Mauritius through a new partnership with the Mauritius Wildlife Foundation .
The Dallas-based company previously announced it was trying to awaken Tasmanian tigers and woolly mammoths from their eternal slumber. Ben Lamb, co-founder and CEO of Colossal Biosciences, said Colossal's advances with the dodo will help bring the bird back to its East African homeland and other soon-to-be extinct birds. He said this could give the company the power to save species.
“The goal of all the species we work with is to return them to their natural habitat,” Lamb said. “This support and cooperation from Mauritian wildlife is a testament to not only the great work our scientific team is doing to bring back the dodo, but also the great work being done by the teams who have successfully reintroduced the dodo to its natural habitat. This is great proof that there is.”
Colossal has not yet set a date for Dodo's return, but Colossal's top officials say its return could be a game-changer for birds like the pink pigeon, which are on the verge of suffering the same fate. Animal Director Matt James said.
The pink pigeon, a 15-inch herbivorous bird native to Mauritius, is also at risk of extinction due to habitat degradation, disease and inbreeding, according to the Natural History Museum.
“The Dodo is going to help the pink pigeon,” he said. “As we develop these mega-extinction programs, we are identifying species that will directly benefit from those technologies. It is now a tool that we can begin to apply to other pigeon conservation projects.”
According to the company, there are currently only about 500 pink pigeons left in Mauritius.
The technology Lamb, James, and the Colossal team are using to bring the species back from the dead is genome editing, a method of changing the DNA of cells and organisms. By partnering with Mauritius, Colossal believes it can further advance its efforts, James said.
“We can seamlessly apply these high-quality reference genomes to all the amazing species that currently exist, such as the Mauritian pink pigeon, but that's just the first step,” he said. “While mammalian cloning was decriminalized in the late 90s, bird cloning does not exist today. It is very important to invest.”
With strong backing, the company is pursuing its dream of reviving the Dodo. In January, Colossal secured a $150 million investment from more than a dozen companies, including Dallas private equity investor Victor Vescovo and CIA-backed Incutel.
Mr Lam said he expected Colossal to send team members to Mauritius next year to work with the Mauritius Wildlife Foundation and local government.
Colossal's partnership with Mauritius may help the company shed some of the Jurassic Park comparisons it has received in the past, Lam said.
“We've been hearing all of these comments for years,” Lamb said. “But we have good reason to do it because when you remove animals from an ecosystem, you feel an ecological vacuum. We're not going to build something that shouldn't exist.” We are focused on undoing the sins of the past and returning the species that humanity helped to destroy to their rightful home.”
