Startup Plans Bluebuck's Return

An antelope wiped out by European hunters more than two centuries ago could one day be roaming again—if a Dallas startup succeeds. Colossal Biosciences said the bluebuck, a slate-hued antelope last seen in South Africa's Cape region around 1800, is now its sixth de-extinction target, joining the woolly mammoth, dodo, moa, Tasmanian tiger, and dire wolf. CEO Ben Lamm tells Reuters the team is two years into the project and in the gene-editing phase. "The next stage will be doing embryo transfer into elephants," Lamm said, per Axios.

Colossal argues that bringing back a species that humans erased is a moral duty. To do it, the startup is using DNA taken mainly from a preserved bluebuck skin in a Swedish museum, then comparing it to that of the roan antelope, its closest living relative and a 98%-plus genetic match. Researchers are editing roan cells to add key bluebuck traits, with plans to turn those cells into embryos and implant them in surrogate roan mothers; gestation would run about nine months, per Reuters. The company has already produced three "dire wolf" pups via edited gray wolf DNA, though some experts label them modified wolves rather than truly de-extinct animals.