De-Extinction: The Wrong Solution to the Problem

     In 2003, scientists set out to accomplish the unthinkable.  Using cloning techniques, they transferred fifty five bucardo embryos (an extinct sub-species of Spanish ibex, formally known as Capra pyrenaica pyrenaica) to closely related species.  The bucardo lived in the Pyrenees Mountains for thousands of years before being hunted to extinction.  By 1999, a single bucardo, a female named Celia, remained.  After her death, Celia’s cells were preserved in labs until researchers removed the nuclei, injected them into “blank” goat eggs missing their own DNA, and finally implanted these eggs into hybrid mothers (Zimmer, 2013).  Of these fifty five embryos, only one was carried to term, only to die of respiratory problems ten minutes after birth.  This short-lived animal became the first animal to be born after its species had gone extinct (Folch, et al., 2009).

(Learn Genetics, 2013)

     Ten years later, the technology to accomplish this feat has become both cheaper and better.  Other extinct animals, such as the passenger pigeon and the wooly mammoth, have the possibility of a new future with the help of “de-extinction” tools (Zimmer, 2013).  In his TED talk about “de-extinction”, Stewart Brand (a leader in the field) highlights the growing international community of scientists dedicated to using advancing biotechnologies to revive animals such as the passenger pigeon or European Auroch (Brand, 2013).  However, is de-extinction really the solution?  Will bringing back extinct species really mitigate our impacts on biodiversity?

(Scienceray, 2011).  Woolly mammoths -- coming soon to a zoo near you?

     Brand speaks of a moral obligation to undo the damage that humanity has wrought, but de-extinction simply gives the extinct animals one more chance to be destroyed again without fixing the underlying factors that made them go extinct in the first place.  In his National Geographic article, Glen Albrecht of Murdoch University in Australia states that “Without an environment to put re-created species back into, the whole exercise is futile and a gross waste of money” (Zimmer, 2013).  If the passenger pigeon, the headline animal of Brand’s TED talk, were to return today, it would be greeted by a drastically altered environment.  The “most abundant bird in the world”, as Brand calls it, would now have to deal with some of the most abundant air traffic in the world, not to mention the scores of other man-made things that normally kill birds each year (such as radio towers and skyscraper lights) (NPR, 2012).  Take a look at the top image, in which Neumann has mapped human interactions with passenger pigeons.  The circled region in Neumann’s photo is historic, deciduous forest breeding grounds favored by passenger pigeons.  Then compare this with the photo on the bottom, which is a NASA image showing the same area today.  As you can see, the passenger pigeons’ historical breeding grounds no longer exist.  Today, this area is covered by sprawling urban regions.  If we did succeed in bringing a species such as the passenger pigeon back, would they even have a place to go?  

Top: (Neumann, 1985).  Bottom: (NASA, 2012).

     De-extinction’s greatest failure is the great segments of life it will fail to protect or bring back.  According to a paper by Regnier, mollusks were the group most affected by extinction in the 2007 IUCN red list, but their extinctions went largely unnoticed (Regnier, Fontaine, & Bouchet, 2009).  All the species that Brand mentions as candidates for de-extinction are mammals or birds.  It’s unlikely that un-charismatic life will be revived (if its passing is even noticed to begin with), since we tend to care more about the species we can see.  However, less popular groups such as insects, mollusks, and microbes have just as big of an impact on biodiversity and ecosystem services as more popular groups, if not more.  One has to ask the question: is de-extinction really about restoring biodiversity, or is it more of a tool to ease our guilt over species we miss?

      De-extinction is a novel and exciting possibility.  It’s fascinating to consider that our children could one day observe a live woolly mammoth at the zoo.  However, Brand is correct in stating that conventional conservation efforts must remain a priority.  We tend to focus on a select group of species that have gone extinct, but many thousands more live species today are on the brink of extinction due to habitat loss, climate change, overexploitation, and a myriad of other human-caused problems.  Unless we change the way that we as humans interact with the world, biodiversity will continue to suffer whether or not we have the bucardo or the passenger pigeon around.  While de-extinction may prove useful in the future, the hype around it may distract us from the real problems of today.  De-extinction carries with it the risk of procrastination that is so often coupled with technology.  Why should we bother to protect and conserve species and ecosystems that we can simply revive tomorrow?  From that point of view, de-extinction then becomes the ultimate cop out -- an excuse to continue our harmful practices to avoid the hard work that change will require. 

Works Cited

Brand, S. (2013, March). The dawn of de-extinction. Are you ready? (TED Talks) Retrieved from www.TED.com: http://www.ted.com/talks/stewart_brand_the_dawn_of_de_extinction_are_you_ready.html

Folch, J., Cocero, M., Chesne, P., Alabart, J., Dominguez, V., Cognie, Y., et al. (2009, April). First birth of an animal from an extinct subspecies (Capra pyrenaica pyrenaica) by cloning. Theriogenology, 71(6), 1026-1034.

Learn Genetics. (2013). Why Clone? Retrieved from http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/tech/cloning/whyclone/

NASA. (2012, December). NOAA Satellite Reveals New Views of Earth at Night. Retrieved from www.Nasa.gov: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/NPP/news/earth-at-night.html

Neumann, T. W. (1985). Human-Wildlife Competition and the Passenger Pigeon: Population Growth from System Destabilization. Human Ecology, 389-410.

NPR. (2012, June). Blinded by the Light, Birds Crash into Radio Towers. Retrieved from www.npr.com: http://www.npr.org/2012/06/13/154959104/blinded-by-the-light-birds-crash-into-radio-towers

Regnier, C., Fontaine, B., & Bouchet, P. (2009). Not knowing, not recording, not listing: numerous unnoticed mollusk extinctions. Conservation Biology, 1214-1241.

Schorger, A. (1955). The Passenger Pigeon: Its History and Extinction.

Zimmer, C. (2013, April). Bringing Them Back to Life. Retrieved May 2013, from ngm.nationalgeographic.com: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/04/125-species-revival/zimmer-text