Tropical cyclone damage to ecosystems is intensifying under warming oceans

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Breakthrough in mammoth revival efforts. A team of scientists at
Colossal Biosciences has made a significant step toward reviving the
extinct wooly mammoth by successfully generating induced pluripotent stem cells
iPSCs from elephants, making the process of de extinction more feasible.
In a major breakthrough, scientists have created elephant stem cells

(00:22):
that could bring them closer to resurrecting the long extinct
wooly mammoth. According to a statement from Colossal Biosciences, the
research team announced that they successfully derived iPSCs from Asian
elephants Elephis maximus. iPSCs are reprogrammed cells capable of becoming
any type of cell in the body. This allows researchers

(00:43):
to study the adaptive traits that made wooly mammoths Mammothis
primogenius unique from their closest living relatives and potentially edit
their genes without needing tissue samples from living animals. These
cells provide a tremendous advantage for our de extinction work,
said Ariana Hasso, head of Biological sciences at Colossal Biosciences.

(01:03):
According to Haysali, iPSCs are critical to understanding the cellular
and genetic mechanisms behind the traits that allowed wooly mammoths
to thrive in the Arctic, such as their thick fur,
curved tusks, fat storage, and domed skulls. iPSCs also paved
the way for creating elephant egg and sperm cells, crucial

(01:25):
for mammoth reproduction in the lab. With fewer than fifty
two thousand Asian elephants left in the wild, according to
the WWF, collecting cells from live individuals is challenging. Previously,
deriving iPSCs from elephants posed a major challenge due to
the complexity of the elephant genome, which contains unique traits
not found in other species. Researchers overcame this hurdle by

(01:49):
suppressing a key gene TP fifty three, responsible for regulating
cell growth and preventing uncontrolled cell replication. This breakthrough could
shed light on earth early developmental processes in elephants, which
is currently one of the biggest obstacles to wooly mammoth revival.
If the research team can successfully create wooly mammoth embryos

(02:10):
by combining ancient mammoth DNA with elephant cells. They would
need to implant the embryo into a surrogate elephant to
complete the mammoths twenty two month pregnancy. Elephant pregnancies are
extremely long and complex, so understanding their developmental biology is crucial.
Iisali explained. While editing mammoth embryos is no longer the
biggest challenge, bringing a healthy baby mammoth to term will

(02:33):
require time and effort. Haisali's team is still working on
alternative methods to create elephant iPSCs and to nurture the
newly developed cells. Reprogramming elephant cells into iPSCs has applications
beyond the Wooly Mammoth project, with potential to enhance elephant
conservation by enabling researchers to produce and artificially fertilize reproductive

(02:54):
cells