Scientists have brought us a step closer to reviving Wooly Mammoths………. By starting with mice. They’ve created Wooly Mice.
Long story short, scientists spent a long time going through the DNA of dozens of different elephants as well as 59 mammoths. They figured out which genes brings about the “wooliness”. And then they played God and put those genetic traits into mice to create hair that grows 3 times longer than usual. And now, they look like Siberian Hamsters. Super cute, fluffy little hamsters which happen to have long hairless tails.
I mean, if the scientists put a little more effort into their jobs, they could have made the tails wooly too, but now it just looks unfinished. Sort of like wearing an frilly, all white wedding dress and a pair of orange Crocks with it.
Why do we even want to bring wooly mammoths back? There’s a long explanation about studying survival traits in cold regions and blah, blahdy, blah. That’s all nice, but what do they taste like? Any time I think about them, my mind locks in on Fred Flintstone with that giant rack of mammoth ribs. It sounds delicious.
By the way, mice and mammoths share 96.4% of identical genetic traits. But reviving the mammoths is still a ways off. That last 3.6% leaves 13 million genetic change possibilities to deal with.