JPHiP Forum

General => General Discussion => Topic started by: Foxy Brown on August 18, 2006, 08:46:18 AM

Title: Return of the woolly mammoth?
Post by: Foxy Brown on August 18, 2006, 08:46:18 AM

Descendants of extinct mammals like the giant woolly mammoth might one day walk the Earth again. It isn't exactly Jurassic Park, but Japanese researchers are looking at the possibility of using sperm from frozen animals to inseminate living relatives. (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060815.gtsperm0815/BNStory/Technology/home)

Title: Return of the woolly mammoth?
Post by: shadowstar on August 18, 2006, 03:26:29 PM

"It isn't exactly Jurassic Park,"

....Yeah, just give it time, folks :rolleyes:

Title: Return of the woolly mammoth?
Post by: chera on August 19, 2006, 01:02:18 AM

Lots of "if"s in that article....  High probability of getting massive birth defects among the elephant womb mothers.  Given that elephants relatively rare already, I don't see any researchers getting permission to endanger the life of a female elephant to run these experiments.

Title: Return of the woolly mammoth?
Post by: suki* on August 21, 2006, 04:29:06 AM

...

Shouldn't these people be channeling their brilliance towards the conservation of what we have instead of attempting to bring prehistoric mammals back to life? Like chera said, elephants are dying out already so why not just help them breed instead?

The things people do/ want to do in order to get famous...

Title: Return of the woolly mammoth?
Post by: chera on August 22, 2006, 02:20:45 AM

Artificially increasing elephant fertility is really a last ditch effort among biologists.  The ideal solution would be to reduce the strain that human activities place on their ecosystems.  Given the elephants space to roam and be elephanty, and they'll be humpin' like rabbits in no time...