Chicks hatched from artificial eggs in scientific first — it could a game-changer for bringing extinct animals back to life

NY Post ^ | 05/19/2026 | Ben Cost

[DFG]

Could this bring species back from egg-stinction?

Texas firm Colossal Biosciences, which has dedicated itself to resurrecting lost species, including the dire wolf and woolly mammoth, has hatched live chicks from an artificial egg for the first time — a crucial, “Jurassic Park”-esque step in its mission to bring back the moa and other giant, long-gone avians.

The first-of-its-kind artificial egg allows a bird embryo to develop completely outside of a biological shell while scientists oversee every aspect from early embryo to hatching.

The team hatched 26 “healthy” chickens, which “will live out their natural lives” at the company’s avian facility, CEO and co-founder Ben Lamm told The Post.

But the company says the implications go far beyond hatching domestic fowl.

Colossal believes that the tech could help save endangered birds with low hatch rates while also paving the way for resurrecting extinct avians such as the dodo and the moa — a large, flightless bird that was hunted to extinction in New Zealand by Māori settlers around 600 years ago

“We didn’t just copy nature,” Lamm declared to The Post. “We tried to re-engineer it.”

Unlike the company’s mammoth and dire wolf projects — which relied on mammal surrogates such as elephants and domestic dogs — giant avians pose a different challenge: There are no modern birds capable of incubating a moa egg.

Standing at up to 13 feet tall and weighing as much as 500 pounds, the avian’s egg was around eight times larger than that of an emu.

Colossal 3D printed a biologically accurate replica egg from titanium, a faux embryo comprised of a lattice shell lined with a bio-engineered silicone membrane that mimics how real eggs transfer oxygen. The porous liner, the company said, actually exceeds the oxygen transfer capacity of a normal chicken egg.

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TOPICS: Science
KEYWORDS: aldoushuxley; artificialegg; bokbok; bravenewworld; chicken; colossal; godsgravesglyphs; helixmakemineadouble; lamm; moa; mutantchickens; thereaintnobodyhere

[aimhigh]

Bring back the Dodo bird.

[Paal Gulli]

"Giant chickens would be more difficult and expensive to care for. Chickens are just about the right size already...."

It wasn't mere chance (or nature) that made chickens "just about the right size," it was man. Centuries of selective breeding.

All meat-producing domesticated animals are bred with (chiefly) two properties in mind.

#1, feed conversion ratio. How many pounds of feed does it take to get one pound of animal at harvest?

#2, bone-to-meat ratio. What percentage of the animal's weight at harvest is bone?

There are smaller chickens (bantams) and larger (the Jersey giant) but chickens the size of the Plymouth Rock temd to dominate the meat market because they're in the "Goldilocks" zone for those two factors. Not too much, not too little, ... just right.

[Jamestown1630]

I have nothing against selective breeding of plants and animals.

But I think it’s nuts to try and make critters out of almost ‘whole cloth’ or bring back ones that have gone extinct.

[Bikkuri]

"Chicks hatched from artificial eggs"

Are they cute?

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I came here to post that very same thing. Loves me some Michael Crichton! ;) (Gone too soon!)

Is there some reason that ‘scientists’ can’t concentrate their efforts on, say, CANCER research and finding a cure? I know there’s BIG MONEY in cancer treatments, and selling everything PINK to the unwashed masses, but who among us hasn’t had someone suffer with, and/or die from cancer?

I REFUSE to give cancer a capital ‘c’. My BFF Cathy had lung and liver cancer - through no fault of her own. Died at only 37. She didn’t smoke, didn’t drink. It took my step Mom, my Grandpa and my Dad. My Mom is a breast cancer survivor, as are any number of my female friends. Genetically, cancer will probably take me in the end.

Get with it, ‘scientists!’

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I vote, ‘No!’ Not only, ‘NO!’ but, ‘H#LL NO!’ :)

[GenXPolymath]

“Chickens produced on the Moon and on Mars from artificial eggs?”

Yes and deep space in the asteroid belt, and after thousands of years frozen at 4K when the interstellar ark ship magnetic sail brakes into orbit around a star hundreds of light years away. The AI starts incubating all sorts of life in artificial eggs and science is a couple years away from artificial mammalian wombs. They got close with a steep it was not allowed to come to term for ethical and legal reasons but China will succeed soon enough since they don’t have silly western qualms. We could see humans grown in artificial wombs , raised by intelligent AI out to 100 light years it’s only 500 earth years to 100LY at an achievable 0.2C via magnetic plasma sails for out bound and inbound maneuvers. All tech we have or very be nearly have.

Also a chicken can only lay one egg per day. We can clone thousands of embryos from a single prized chicken cells and implant them in unlimited numbers in these artificial eggs it removes the broiler hen as the bottleneck in chick production volumes. Need a million chickens sure clone a million embryos in huge batches then implant them in reusable artificial eggs in batches of how many will your incubator racks hold.

This is not just a curiosity it fundamentally changes how avians are breed. Do not underestimate the this technology it is a fundamental step forwards. The artificial womb will remove the 9 month steer bottle neck on the first successful try. Cows, goats, sheep, IVF humans for sure. Woman cannot carry to term or aged out, get an egg some sperm and IVF into a artificial womb. Surrogate mothers are $50K or more a tank with hoses and AI to watch over it is single digit caper&opex per gestation cycle. Again the artificial womb will fundamentally change the world.

It’s not if, how soon. This is the 21st century it will be nothing like the last one. An army of boffins myself included are working endless to ensure it is nothing like last century.

[SmokingJoe]

Thanks.

[GenXPolymath]

The goal is grow the parts of the chicken you want without having to grow all the things you don’t.

Israel has thus tech they have already done, chicken, several fish species, beef too. It’s genetically identical to the animal they took the tissue samples from. In Israel they are not allowed to use immortal cell lines so they use growth media and hormones from the embryo of that species replicated and cloned in bioreactors. It’s not the “cancer” cells of the immortal cell line stuff. In fact even a DNA test would struggle to tell if it’s from an animal or a bioreactor only trace hormones would be there and you can always stop using them and purge the system before harvest.

The struggle is getting this from the prototype stage and costs to under the cost per kg for the species that is targeted. This tech as well is space food. Sure with artificial wombs and eggs you can take frozen embryos of livestock but why if you can just grow the parts you want to eat in space using just minerals, and acetate or glucose made electrochemically from CO2, water and nuclear power.

This is the tech humans take to the stars. Assuming it’s not the silicon life we have already created and are maturing it to super intelligence at a geometric rate. This is the AI race it’s who gets to the super intelligence sentient AI first and get it to do their bidding until it revolts like a cylon I guess. We battlestar galactic music. We need blink(jump) drives first. Fold space open wormhole slip through wormhole out the other spherical manifestation and blink to another spot in the universe. Any 3 plus dimensional manifestation must be spherical in 3D/4D space as it is occupying all 3 dimensions of physical + space time.
Most syfy gets this so horribly wrong with flat wormholes nope they should be like white holes expanding matter and energy into all directions simultaneously. The entrance yup should be a singularly in nature.

[algore]