Pilcher - Bring back the king the new science of de-extinction

A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR

Helen Pilcher is a tea-drinking, biscuit-nibbling science and comedy writer with a PhD in Cell Biology from Londons Institute of Psychiatry. A former reporter for Nature , she now specializes in biology, medicine and quirky off -the-wall science, and writes for outlets including New Scientist and BBC Focus . Unusually for a self-proclaimed geek, Helen also used to be a stand-up comedian, before the arrival of children meant she couldnt physically stay awake past 9pm. She now gigs from time to time, and lives in rural Warwickshire with her husband, three kids and besotted dog.

Also available in the Bloomsbury Sigma series:

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Atoms Under the Floorboards by Chris Woodford

Spirals in Time by Helen Scales

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A is for Arsenic by Kathryn Harkup

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The Tyrannosaur Chronicles by David Hone

Soccermatics by David Sumpter

Big Data by Timandra Harkness

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Science and the City by Laurie Winkless

Bring Back the King by Helen Pilcher

Furry Logic by Matin Durrani and Liz Kalaugher

Built on Bones by Brenna Hassett

My European Family by Karin Bojs

4th Rock from the Sun by Nicky Jenner

Patient H69 by Vanessa Potter

Catching Breath by Kathryn Lougheed

PIG/PORK by Pa Spry-Marqus

The Planet Factory by Elizabeth Tasker

for Amy, Jess, Sam, Joe, Mum and Higgs the Dog Particle

to the moon and back

and for my Dad

who gave me my love of wild things.

Contents

When I was a kid, we used to go on family holidays to the Jurassic Coast, where dark grey cliffs cast ominous shadows on the shingle-smattered beach. It was chilly, wet and windy. My brother and I were forced to wear itchy, woolly hats, high-waisted flares and unflattering cagoules. We drank tepid chocolate from a flimsy Thermos and sat on slimy boulders munching biscuits. My parents called it character building and cheaper than a package deal. I called it borderline pneumonia. The sun never shone on the holidays of my childhood, but there was always a chink in the clouds. There was always the possibility that one day we might stumble across the remains of some prehistoric behemoth. For hidden among the rocks at Charmouth in Dorset are the fossilised remains of creatures that swam, walked and flew 200 million years ago pterosaurs, Nessie-like plesiosaurs and an armoured dinosaur called Scelidosaurus . How much I longed to find them. How much I longed to meet them.

But holidays came and went, hopes raised and dashed. I never found a Scelidosaurus bone, or any other fossil for that matter. But I never gave up. I kept going back, and now enjoy subjecting my own three children to the same brand of seaside sadism. Endowed with an uncanny fossil-detecting sixth-sense, they are orders of magnitude more successful than I ever was. With their sharp eyes and wilful determination, they brave the elements to eat ice cream on the coldest of days, and find fossils by the bucket load. More satisfying than any shop-bought souvenir, these fossils are a constant source of joy and wonder. Theyre also free, and apart from the ones found in China, are not made in China. My kids have collected hundreds of fossils but somehow the enigma of this prehistoric world keeps pulling us back, looking for another fix, and prompting us to ask questions such as: What were these creatures really like?, Could a human beat a T. rex at arm wrestling? and Can we bring them back to life?

This is a book, not about arm wrestling, but about whether or not we really can bring extinct species back to life. It is the story of the scientists who are trying to make it happen. Its about their ingenuity and dogged persistence; their reassuringly thick skins in the face of sceptics and critics who say de-extinction either cant or shouldnt be done. Its also the story of the animals they seek to resurrect; extinct species that once graced the Earth but that had been presumed lost forever. This book is not designed to be an exhaustive review of current de-extinction projects. Instead, I have unashamedly chosen to feature the species and projects that interest me most. Apologies to the worlds ugly animals and to plants you dont get much of a look in. The book starts in the late Cretaceous Period, 65 million years ago, from whence controversial claims for the existence of ancient biomolecules in dinosaur bones have been made, and finishes in the future, where de-extinction could help to enhance biodiversity. En route , it detours via Siberia in the last Ice Age, Mauritius in the seventeenth century and Graceland in the 1970s.

In my time I have been a scientist, a stand-up comedian and a serious science journalist. I have a lifelong love of fossils and quirky animals, and am a dab-hand at growing cells in dishes and tinkering with their DNA. When I first read about de-extinction a few years back, I was upset; not because I thought science had spiralled out of control, but because I wondered whether, if I had pursued my scientific career, I could have had a pet dodo by now. Its because of these interests that I find the prospect of de-extinction absolutely spellbinding. I now find myself on the outside of the laboratory looking in, watching as brilliant scientists push the boundaries of human knowledge and redefine what is possible. De-extinction, I hope to persuade you, is not something to be feared or resisted. Its a force for good, not a tool of the dark side.

Oh, and did I mention that there is a chapter about de-extincting Elvis Presley? The quick-witted among you will all too readily point out that Elvis is not technically extinct, to which I say, technically you are correct. But extinct? Dead? Does Elvis know the difference? Fortunately for us, humans are not extinct, but arent you curious to find out whether the same technology being used to de-extinct the woolly mammoth could be used to stage Presleys greatest ever Comeback Special? Just so you know, no one is seriously planning to clone the King of Rock n Roll, so the Elvis chapter is my folly, but it makes for an interesting thought experiment, and begs the question, Are you clonesome tonight?

High on a hill was a lonely goat-oh,

Lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo.

Lived on a mountain, very remote-oh,

Lay ee odl lay ee odl-oo .

Spent every moment, happy and free-oh,

Lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo.

Then she got killed by a falling tree-oh,

Lay ee odl lay ee odl-oo .

so goes the song of the last ever bucardo, a wild mountain goat called Celia, who lived and died on the vertiginous cliffs of the Spanish Pyrenees. It was 6 January, 2000. Just as people were taking down their Christmas decorations and recovering from millennium-sized hangovers, the stocky bleater was doing what mountain goats do best: springing deftly from boulder to boulder without a care in the world. An adult female in the prime of her life, Celia was a fine-looking beast. She had large curvy horns, the obligatory goatee beard and that permanent look of surprise that comes from wearing your eyes on the side of your head. Bigger than the average goat, Celia weighed as much as a washing machine, but was much more agile. She spent her days darting among the lanky pine trees that cling perilously to the precipices, stopping only to nibble the occasional blade of grass or cast an imposing silhouette against the clear, cloudless sky. But when the tree fell in the forest, did Celia hear it? It seems unlikely, but if she did it was already too late. The large tree came crashing down without warning with the hapless Celia standing directly in its path. She never stood a chance. The weighty trunk crushed her skull and Celia bleated no more. It was a sad, sad day. The very last of her kind, the bucardo went extinct