When asked if their latest landmark breakthrough in the quest to restore the woolly mammoth to the world has seen humanity seize control of evolution for the first time, Colossal CEO Ben Lamm has to laugh.
"That's - wow, that's a bold suggestion. I mean we're a bold company, but even for us that might be a bit much," he told 9news.com.au over Zoom.
His colleague, Dr Beth Shapiro, agreed. "Humans have been controlling evolution for thousands of years – turning grey wolves into chihuahuas. We've just taken it a little further."
The Colossal woolly mouse has had its genes edited to manifest woolly mammoth-like characteristics. (Colossal)
Indeed – just a little. The woolly mammoth team at Colossal recently debuted the Colossal woolly mouse – a mouse that has been genetically engineered to suit colder climates with mammoth-like traits such as colouring and coat length.
Trying to put it in terms the layman on the other end of the call can interpret, Lamm and Shapiro outline the scope of the achievement.
They were able to modify seven genes simultaneously in a "pipeline" approach, drawn from the computational analysis of 59 woolly, Columbian, and steppe mammoth genomes ranging from 3500 to over 1.2 million years old.
The importation of eight modifications across seven genes – an unprecedented achievement – into a regular mouse embryo has, apparently come off without a hitch.
The Colossal woolly mouse next to a normal mouse. (Colossal)
Lamm said the seven modified genes had all "100 per cent" manifested in the live mouse, with no detrimental effects.
"It's a breakthrough in that it validates what we've been doing, but it doesn't accelerate anything. It means we don't have to go back," he said.
But that doesn't mean we will necessarily be waiting decades to welcome woolly mammoths back to the world.
Lamm said they were on target to reach their goal of a viable "woolly mammoth" embryo by the end of 2026. That means a live mammoth calf could be born a couple months before 2029 – after the 22-month elephant pregnancy.
An illustration of a woolly mammoth. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Meanwhile, what happens to the mice?
They have their own habitat and, Shapiro says, there are no plans to sell them.
"Our mice live very, very well, compared to a typical mouse," Lamm said.
Shapiro said the next six to 12 months would also involve behavioural studies and ethical experiments on the furry little specimens, which would all contribute toward the ultimate goal.
What does the future hold?
Colossal's woolly mammoth project, as both Lamm and Shapiro acknowledged, tends to get most of the press.
But they have two other teams working on the resurrection of two other animals - the dodo, and the thylacine. We'll come back to the latter.
"There's bit of competition between the three teams," Shapiro said.
Dodo skeleton (Getty)
The long-extinct dodo could come back via chicken. (Getty)
The avian team in particular is thriving, having developed a workaround for the impossibility of cloning a bird.
"Standard" cloning – the way it's been done since the days of Dolly the sheep – can't be replicated with birds due to the differences in egg development.
Instead, what the team is aiming to do is edit the primordial germ cell, which controls the production of eggs or sperm.
Putting it as plainly as possible, they can theoretically make everyday chickens lay dodo eggs.
Thylacine
The last known thylacine was captured in Tasmania, and kept at the Beaumaris Zoo in Hobart. (Wikimedia Commons)
As for the thylacine, the extinct predator is coming back to us through the tiny fat-tailed dunnart.
Like the thylacine, the dunnart is a marsupial with sharp teeth, providing a good genetic base to work with.
Additionally, as Shapiro pointed out, marsupial babies – whether they grow up to be a 1.8-metre tall red kangaroo, or a mouse-sized dunnart – all start out more or less the same size.
"That means we can move the infant to larger and larger pouches as it grows," she said.
What's it all for?
Mountaineer George Leigh Mallory, when asked why he proposed to climb Mount Everest, supposedly replied "Because it's there".
Colossal, confronting the awesome power of nature on another scale, thankfully have more thoughtful answers.
All the techniques outlined above can be used to pump up the numbers of still-extant but dwindling species as well.
Gibraltar Range waratah
New additions added to Australia's threatened species list
And bringing back the woolly mammoth, Shapiro said, could help "stabilise" the now-warming habitats the animal once roamed.
"It's not the goal to bring back a 100 per cent woolly mammoth clone," she said.
But the species the team does bring back will be able to help the environment, by aerating the soil, spreading seeds, and performing in greater symbiosis with the habitat.
"We want to make extinction a thing of the past," Shapiro said.