Every year, when the sun reaches Siberia, groups of explorers set out in search of mammoths. Colamelus and other forms of these extinct creatures surface so frequently that indigenous people use them to prop up their campaign stores or sell them on the black market. At best, those who find some of these carcasses are scientific, allowing extraordinary discoveries to be made about the missing animals of Idad del Hilo.
Then, a team of researchers announces a seemingly impossible challenge: salvage the oldest RNA ever obtained. It was isolated from the body of Yucca, a huge calf that was chased by cave lions about 40,000 years ago. Videos recorded by their scientists show the amazingly preserved skin covering the skin of these animals, as if they had died before that time.
Until now it was thought that RNA, a biological molecule essential for life, was too fragile to survive the period of time after death. His discovery of the mammoth raises knowledge about how these animals’ organisms function to a new level, and may help eliminate some of their characteristics, the study’s authors acknowledge.
“Islaring ARN allows us to better understand what their biology was like when they were alive,” summarizes Emilio Marmol, first author of the study. New molecular analysis tools allow us to recover more biological information. Until now, it has been possible to extract DNA from mammoths from more than a million years ago. Sometimes, the remains are preserved so well in the cold ground that they maintain their original three-dimensional structure. Just one month ago, members of this same team were able to rescue DNA found in the mammoth’s soil, including the bacteria that lived in its intestines.
Every cell in the body contains a complete copy of the genome, complete DNA, but with only this information it is impossible to know whether a cell is a skin, heart, or brain cell. To do this, we have to know which genes are active, how much and where, and this information is what RNA provides.
The molecule was isolated from the animal’s muscle. This lets you know which genes were on at the time of your death. “We see that this is normal muscle tissue, but there is also stress-related RNA,” explains Marmol, 35, a Malagueno paleogeneticist who works at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. Halazgo works with what scientists suggested a few years ago to find Yucca remains in Russia’s Yukagir region: This animal was hunting predators, perhaps cave lions. The investigation will be published next month in the scientific journal cell.
The hall opens a new field. Until now, it has only been possible to extract RNA from ancient remains. In 2019, he managed to take shelter from a permafrost dog that lived 14,000 years ago. The work was directed by Tom Gilbert, current President of Marmol. The molecule appeared in liver, muscle and skin remains, but it was very degraded. “It was a test of the concept that we needed to start working on this,” Marmol recalls. On this occasion, tissues from 10 mammoths were analyzed and RNA was obtained from three of them. The entire RNA is also conserved, but in Yucca’s case, it is the most complete and revealing sequence ever obtained for cleavage. This study made it possible, for example, to determine that this mammoth was a young male, and not a female, as was thought from studying its DNA.
Swedish geneticist Löv Dahlen is one of the studio’s leading authors. In recent years, his team was able to extract DNA from the remains of mammoths from more than a million years ago. “The results show that RNA molecules can survive much longer than thought,” highlights the scientist in a press release published by Stockholm University. “This means that on the ground we can study active genes in various extinct animals, but it will also be possible to determine the sequences of RNA viruses, such as influenza or coronaviruses, preserved in ancient Hilo remains,” he explains.
Dalin is also a consultant for the US company Colossal which aspires to “quench” mammals using the Asian elephant as a plant. Marmol understands that the company was interested in the tools that were used to extract RNA from the remains. This advance could allow us to better understand mammalian biology, especially a more complete view of the molecular processes of DNA.
But the Spanish researcher is “skeptical” about Colossal’s goals. “I don’t think it’s possible to reintroduce populations of these animals that can be sustained over time. Return to some internal and external traits,” I call out. Marmol points out that recovering the Tasmanian tiger, a dog that has become extinct in the past three years, is more possible given that its habitat remains intact. In 2023, their team was able to extract and analyze RNA from 130-year-old Tasmanian tigers that were dissected and displayed in the museum.
“It is wrong to recover this kind of information, because RNA is very unstable and cannot be preserved for a long time,” says Nicolas Rascovan, an expert on ancient DNA at the Pasteur Institute in France. The scientist, who was not involved in the study, also points out that “ARN, and above all the messenger ARN, opens the door not only to knowing the genetic information of an organism, but also to knowing how to read it, how to express it and what it can do,” he said. One thing that might be possible is to compare these processes in present-day mammals and elephants in detail. In conclusion, the work is limited to studying muscle tissue only, and RNA is a very specific molecule for each organ, so it cannot be extrapolated from distinct features.
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