Tassie tiger cloning 'pie-in-the-sky science'

[Tim Williams <twilliams_alpha@hotmail.com>]

This is of only tangential relevance to dinosaur science.  Nevertheless, it 
does remind me of the science behind Jurassic Park.  The problems associated 
with cloning a mammal that went extinct in the previous century pale in 
comparison to what would be needed in order to clone a dinosaur Jurassic 
Park-style.  (This is something I've been asked on a few occasions.)

(BTW, "Tassie" is Australian slang for the island state of Tasmania.)


Tassie tiger cloning 'pie-in-the-sky science'

By Deborah Smith, Science Editor

February 17, 2005

http://www.smh.com.au/news/Science/Tassie-tiger-cloning-pieinthesky-science/2005/02/16/1108500157295.html

The more than $350,000 spent trying to clone the extinct Tasmanian tiger had 
gone to "pie in the sky" science and it was sensible for the Australian 
Museum to have abandoned the project, scientists said yesterday.

A University of Tasmania zoologist, Randolph Rose, said millions of dollars 
more would be needed to try to resurrect the thylacine and this money could 
be better spent on living animals such as Tasmanian devils, which have been 
ravaged by a mysterious facial tumour disease.

"Let's save what we've got before spending huge amounts of money on a very 
difficult problem," he said. "Cloning an extinct animal is pie in the sky 
science."

A La Trobe University researcher, Mike Westerman, said it was a pity the 
project had been stopped. "But available resources are limited and it is an 
eminently sensible decision. What they are trying to do is far too 
difficult, given our state of knowledge."

The museum team had worked out the partial code of two genes from parts of 
the cell called mitochondria, and the partial code of one gene from the 
nucleus. Tasmanian tigers had about 17 mitochondrial genes and 30,000 
nuclear genes.

"The technical difficulties are immense. Let's work them out on rare living 
animals first and then apply it to something incredibly more difficult [like 
thylacines]," said Dr Westerman, who had extracted DNA from thylacine skin 
and worked out the code of two mitochondrial genes in the 1990s, before the 
museum project began.

Karen Firestone, a scientist who worked on the museum project until 2003, 
said trying to build a library of all the thylacine's genes had proven to be 
"fraught with difficulty".

But she believed other methods might work. "I still think there are avenues 
that could be pursued. But it is up to the museum what it wants to support 
or not. It's not my call."

The museum's director, Frank Howarth, said about $20,000 remained from 
donations to the project, including $337,000 from private benefactors, 
mainly the Discovery Channel, and $20,000 from the State Government. The 
museum covered the cost of a quarter of a senior researcher's salary for 
about four years.

He said he was confident more donations to continue the research could have 
been obtained. "But it would have been unethical to continue seeking 
external funds for something where we thought the chances of success were 
slim, if not non-existent."