Sci Fi Trifles: Useless but essential pop culture tidbits and trivia from the worlds of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror that once you have read them you don’t know how you have lived so long without knowing them.
In Jurassic Park (the book written by Michael Crichton and the film directed by Steven Spielberg), scientists extract the DNA of long dead dinosaurs from mosquitoes preserved in amber in order to create clones of the extinct lizards in the modern day. But did you know that real scientists at this very moment are attempting a variation of this technique to bring back the extinct species of Aurochs, the predecessors to the modern day domesticated cow?
If you have ever wondered why there are no wild cows (except the occasional rogue who escapes from Farmers Joe’s field on a partying binge), it’s because the feral version of this now domesticated species became extinct almost five hundred years ago. Known as Aurochs, these creatures once roamed freely throughout Europe, Asia and North Africa, and domestication of them began somewhere around 6000 BC. The original, wild version of the species became rarer and rarer until they disappeared altogether in the 17th century. An attempt to “recreate” the species was undertaken by German zoo directors in the early 19th century. The belief was that since all of the genes of the original species existed in some capacity in the offshoot variations, then they could breed back the original version. These became known as Heck Aurochs (after brothers Heinz and Lutz who did the selective breeding), but they did not count as a complete re-introduction of the species.
More recently, the Polish Foundation for Recreating the Aurochs is taking science fiction to task and trying something similar to the Michael Crichton story. They plan to take DNA from the bones of Aurochs in museums and recreate the species. They hope that doing so will help them to understand what caused the Aurochs to become extinct in the first place and will provide an assurance that modern-day cattle will not suffer the same fate. But if this actually works, just imagine the possibilities that could follow. Perhaps, just perhaps, Jurassic Park really could happen . . .
Source: Wikipedia
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