How close are we to resurrecting extinct species? That all depends on the DNA.
The process of bringing a species back to life is called de-extinction or resurrection biology. This cutting-edge research typically requires nearly complete DNA sequence information from the extinct species. With current technology, scientists can easily obtain this information from living organisms, frozen tissue samples and sometimes even preserved museum specimens.
A bigger challenge is “ancient DNA” from archaeological sites, samples frozen in permafrost and even some fossils. Nonetheless, scientists have successfully sequenced DNA that is more than half a million years old, as explained in Nature Reviews. Even with new collection technologies, under the best possible conditions, the limit of DNA survival is perhaps 1 million years. The last of the dinosaurs went extinct 65 million years ago, so Jurassic Park likely won’t become a reality anytime soon.
The species seriously being considered for de-extinction include woolly mammoths (which went extinct 4,000 years ago), passenger pigeons (last seen around the year 1900), dodo birds, Carolina parakeets, saber-toothed tigers, gastric-brooding frogs, great auks, quaggas and giant tortoises.
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