Scientists getting closer to resurrect extinct animals
New research indicates that scientists are making remarkable advances that are bringing us closer than ever before to the possibility of resurrecting extinct species.
In the age of DNA, we now know that vanished creatures, like mammoths and mastodons, ground sloths and sabretooth cats, are ultimately nothing more than sequences of the four letters - A, C, T, and G - that make up the genetic blueprint or code of life.
The codes for extinct animals were thought to have died along with them, until recently, when machines like one at the Smithsonian's DNA lab started working magic.
"Just the study of ancient DNA only broke onto the scene 20 years ago or so. The idea that we could harvest DNA from extinct creatures, from fossil bones, learn something about the past," Sean Carroll, a professor of molecular biology and genetics at the University of Wisconsin.
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