Might gene-editing aid endangered species?

Will de-extinction become practical?

Excerpt: "Have you been hearing about the dire wolf lately? Maybe you saw a massive white wolf on the cover of Time magazine or a photo of Game of Thronesauthor George R.R. Martin holding a puppy named after a character from his books.

The dire wolf, a large, wolflike species that went extinct about 12,000 years ago, has been in the news after biotech company Colossal claimed to have resurrected it using cloning and gene-editing technologies. Colossal calls itself a “de-extinction” company. The very concept of de-extinction is a lightning rod for criticism. There are broad accusations of playing God or messing with nature, as well as more focused objections that contemporary de-extinction tools create poor imitations rather than truly resurrected species.

While the biological and philosophical debates are interesting, the legal ramifications for endangered species conservation are of paramount importance. As a legal scholar with a PhD in wildlife genetics, my work focuses on how we legally define the term “endangered species.”

The use of biotechnology for conservation, whether for de-extinction or genetic augmentation of existing species, promises solutions to otherwise intractable problems.

But it needs to work in harmony with both the letter and purpose of the laws governing biodiversity conservation."