A team of scientists recently discovered a woolly mammoth carcass on an island near the Arctic ocean that they were able to recover blood from reviving hope that one day the giant mammals could be cloned, according to Yahoo.
In an interview with Agence France-Presse the Russian leader of the expedition, Semyon Grigoryev, described the find.
"When we broke the ice beneath her stomach, the blood flowed out from there. It was very dark," Grigoryev said. "This find gives us a really good chance of finding living cells, which can help us implement this project to clone a mammoth."
The lower part of the body was very well preserved while most of the upper half, including the head, was eaten by predators. The lower part was preserved due to being frozen in a pool, Grigoryev told Agence France-Presse.
The most remarkable thing about the lower portion of the carcass that had been dead for at least 10,000 years was that the blood was still in liquid form and that muscle tissue was still red, as if the mammoth had been alive a day before.
"This is the most astonishing case in my entire life," Grigoryev said. "How was it possible for it to remain in liquid form? And the muscle tissue is also red, the color of fresh meat."
Grigoryev has been working alongside controversial scientist Whang Woo-Suk in hopes to one day clone a mammoth. Woo-Suk was able to successfully clone a dog for the first time in 2005 but many of his other feats have been discredited, according to Yahoo.
The decision to attempt to clone an extinct animal is a difficult one for scientists to make. Anyone who has seen "Jurassic Park" knows that there can be some dangerous consequences when bringing back creatures from the past. Jacquelyn Gill wrote in Scientific American about the possibilities of bringing back the giant creatures.
"With the sequencing of the wooly mammoth genome complete and recent advancements in biotechnology, the question of whether to clone extinct species like mastodons, dodos, or the Shasta ground sloth is rapidly becoming a question of should, rather than how," Gill wrote.
Gill argues that there are countless things to consider when deciding whether or not it is a good idea to bring back an extinct animal ranging from the food the animal ate to the amount of space necessary for the animal's habitat. In the end Gill argues that maybe people should prove that they can manage species that currently exist before creating the de-extinction of a species.
"If the goal really is de-extinction and not merely the scientific equivalent of achievement unlocked!, then bringing back the mammoth means sustained effort, intensive management, and a massive effort of conservation resources," Gill said. "Before we talk seriously about de-extinction, let's apply the lessons of the wooly mammoth to help save species in the face of pre-extinction."
