Colossal biosciences – a colossal red flag

Colossal Biosciences isn’t exactly a household name. But you’ve probably at least heard of some of their goals and “achievements:” bringing back woolly mammoths and dodo birds, creating “woolly mice” and most recently, they brought dire wolves back from extinction.  

Colossal is the world’s first “de-extinction” company, founded in 2021, and it seems they’re finally living up to their name. 

Or are they? 

First off, Colossal has been touting their dire wolves as the world’s first de-extinction. But there arguably have been other de-extinctions already. Take the Aldabra rail, a flightless bird that lived on the Aldabra atoll and went extinct 136,000 years ago in the wake of a flood. However, its ancestors migrated again to the atoll thousands of years later and re-evolved, so the Aldabra rail is back again today. Or if you’d like to look at a human-driven example, you could take a gander at the Pyrenean ibex, which went extinct and was later successfully cloned in 2003. Admittedly, the clone did die mere minutes after birth, so you might not be able to call that a successful de-extinction. But it was still technically the world’s first human-caused de-extinction. 

Okay, you might be thinking, but these are all just semantics. Who cares if it’s not technically the world’s first de-extinction; it’s still a de-extinction and that’s really cool! 

And, well, to some level, yes — there’s no denying that the technology that went into all of this is impressive, and has significant conservation implications. Modifying genes the way they did for the “dire wolves” could help introduce further genetic diversity into an endangered species, and the more gene diversity in a population, the more chance there is they’ll be able to pull something out of their gene pool to meet evolutionary challenges. This allows them to continue surviving as a species. But even without considering if the dire wolf case truly is the first de-extinction or not — can this honestly be defined as a de-extinction at all?  

To figure that out, let’s take a closer look at the science. Colossal used gray wolves as the basis for their “dire wolves,” claiming that dire wolves are closely related, sharing 99.5% of DNA with gray wolves. A New York Times article claims they were closely related enough that they interbred with the ancestors of modern-day gray wolves 2.6 million years ago. However, a 2021 study found that on the contrary, there was no evidence of interbreeding, that dire wolves were not actually wolves and that they actually diverged 5.7 million years ago, rather than the 4.5 million the New York Times has reported. Nor does it match the press release published by CRISPR Medicine News, saying Colossal has claimed dire wolves were the result of interbreeding between two ancient canid species 3.5-2.5 million years ago.  

Colossal claims that since then they have found more genes that support their view, but they have yet to publish the sequenced genome. They did, however, publish a preprint, which, as of April 17, is not peer-reviewed, a recurring practice for them. The paper also has a substantial “competing interest” statement that specifically lists nine of the 38 authors on the paper by their initials, also stating that “Authors affiliated with Colossal Biosciences and/or Form Bio may hold stock and/or stock options in these companies.” So, in terms of maintaining scientific objectivity, it’s not exactly standard.   

Furthermore, they didn’t actually use any dire wolf DNA. Instead, they sequenced the DNA, then altered a few genes in the gray wolf to make them appear more like a dire wolf, including making the wolves bigger and giving them a white coat. For comparison, imagine taking a bonobo or chimpanzee, two of human’s closest relatives, modifying them to have less hair and shorter arms and proclaiming that you’ve created a human. Visually, it might look more like a human. But I think you would be hard-pressed to say it actually is one. And I think that’s the case with Colossal’s “dire wolves.” These aren’t dire wolves. These are gray wolves that have been genetically modified to permanently wear questionably accurate dire wolf cosplay.   

“Dire wolves” aside, let’s take a look at some of Colossal’s other projects. Earlier this year, Colossal announced that they had created woolly mice, with the ultimate goal of returning woolly mammoths from extinction. 

You might be thinking, “That sounds really cool!” And honestly, that was also my initial reaction. It does sound cool. Colossal’s reason for bringing back woolly mammoths is that they helped to preserve Siberia’s currently melting permafrost, which stores a lot of carbon. If such a thing could be done, it could help reverse climate change. 

Sounds great, but it doesn’t really make any sense at all. 

The world we live in is very different from the world woolly mammoths lived in. There’s no reason to believe our modern-day world would be able to sustain a woolly mammoth population. And there’s also no proof that the woolly mammoths were the ones preserving the climate; in fact, it seems to be the other way around; the climate was preserving the woolly mammoths, and once it changed, they all went extinct.  

Why are they pouring so much money, research and publicity into resurrecting long-extinct charismatic megafauna and playing at Jurassic Park, instead of pouring more money into research for current species? It feels like a waste of funds and a skewed sense of priorities. Colossal claims that de-extinction is the solution. But is it really? If so, why not focus on recently extinct species?  

You could make the argument that they’re still assisting with conservation efforts, and that these feats are necessary to raise funds for conservation. But if that’s the case, I feel like they shouldn’t be treating conservation like a footnote. They could be putting more effort into educating the public on other endangered species, but the vast majority of it is getting lost in all the hubbub of “de-extinction.”  

Nonetheless, I find Colossal to be deliberately misleading and sketchy at best, with their lack of peer review, conflicting stories and emphasis on ‘de-extinction.’ More people should be viewing them and their de-extinction projects with skepticism.