Posted on 08/04/2013 8:27:25 AM PDT by Renfield
t is unlikely that a mammoth could be cloned in the way we created Dolly the sheep, as has been proposed following the discovery of mammoth bones in northern Siberia. However, the idea prompts us to consider the feasibility of other avenues. Even if the Dolly method is not possible, there are other ways in which it would be biologically interesting to work with viable mammoth cells if they can be found.
In order for a Dolly-like clone to be born it is necessary to have females of a closely related species to provide unfertilised eggs, and, if cloned embryos are produced, to carry the pregnancies. Cloning depends on having two cells. One is an egg recovered from an animal around the time when usually she would be mated.
In reality there would be a need for not just one, but several hundred or even several thousand eggs to allow an opportunity to optimise the cloning techniques. The cloning procedure is very inefficient. After all, after several years of research with sheep eggs, Dolly was the only one to develop from 277 cloned embryos. In species in which research has continued, the typical success rate is still only around 5% at best...
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It would be cool beyond words if we could clone mammoths, but like many science-fictiony things, it turns out to be really, really difficult to pull off. Here’s hoping...
It would be very cool to clone mammoths as well as some other of the big mammals that have recently gone extinct e.g. saber tooth tiger.
Counting down the days here ‘til barbecued mammoth ribs...
Yabba-Dabba Do!
Haha. Yum.
It is likely, given the condition of a few of the remains they have found, that they could discover a female with frozen but viable eggs in her ovaries.
Remember, for most mammals, all the eggs the female will have during her adult life are developed in utero.
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