Should we bring back the Tasmanian tiger?

A celebrity-backed company wants to bring extinct animals back. But scientists and philosophers have concerns about this real-life take on Jurassic Park.

It’s been almost 90 years since the last known thylacine died in captivity.  

But Australia may have a chance to rewrite this sad chapter of history. Colossal Biosciences has announced plans to bring back the Tasmanian tiger. 

In a session at SXSW Sydney, the American biotech company announced it had recreated the iconic animal’s genome, part of the process needed to ‘de-extinct’ the thylacine. 

“We’ve also been able to make stem cells for the first time in a marsupial and we’re starting to develop the reproductive technologies in order to grow embryos,” Dr Andrew Pask, a Professor at University of Melbourne involved in the research, said. 

The science seems deceptively simple: retrieve samples from a preserved thylacine head found in a bucket at a Melbourne museum, identify long-lost genetic material, take stem cells from living species with similar DNA, use some gene editing magic and then, hey presto, a thylacine.  

It sounds like something straight out of a Hollywood blockbuster. But Dr Emily Roycroft, an evolutionary biologist from the Research School of Biology at The Australian National University (ANU), thinks the plan has more than its share of plot holes. 

Her work focuses on ensuring that at-risk native mammal populations have sufficient and healthy genetic diversity 

She says the plan to use stem cells from the thylacine’s closest relative, a fat-tailed dunnart may not work. The small mouse-like marsupial is around 40 million years evolutionarily diverged from the Tasmanian tiger. 

“If de-extinction via genome editing was to be done, I would expect to see it done first in an extinct species with a very close living relative, where the genome could be modified in a relatively small number of steps,” Roycroft says. 

It is difficult for scientists to comment on Colossal Bioscience’s plans, as the biotech company’s research hasn’t been shared – there are more press releases than peer reviewed journal articles available online. 

Associate Professor Parwinder Kaur, director of DNA Australia, told the ABC that while she understood the difficulty of the company’s genome sequencing achievements, “it would be lovely to release these claims, following the data”. 

“If we make the claims but they are not peer-reviewed, and they are not approved and they never come to fruition, then it’s a huge disappointment for the entire community,” she said. 

Pask told the ABC that he expected there would peer-reviewed articles on the subject published in early 2025. 

We owe it to the thylacine

But why are Colossal Biosciences trying to bring back extinct animals in the first place?  

The support of celebrity siblings Chris, Luke and Liam Hemsworth has brought global media attention to the cause. Luke Hemsworth is quoted saying we have “the obligation” to bring the thylacine back. 

Some researchers estimate that 100 native species of plants and animals have been listed as extinct since Australia’s colonisation. And while many Australian extinctions can be directly connected to humans or colonial era practices, Roycroft suggests Australians may feel a particular lingering national guilt about the thylacine’s demise. 

“There were government bounties paid for the destruction of many small and medium sized Australian mammals in the late 19th and early 20th century,” Roycroft says. “The thylacine was hunted to extinction because of the idea that it was eating livestock.  

“It makes a lot of sense that, collectively, we might want to undo an extinction that was so clearly driven by the actions of humans. We might like to think that we could correct our past wrongs and bring back this really unique species. But its most likely that this extinction is forever.” 

Dr Ben Bramble, lecturer at the ANU School of Philosophy, says the de-extinction dream may be overlooking the simple truth that what is done cannot be undone. Trying to restore things to the way they were before complicates the ethics of de-extinction, even if attempted with good intentions. 

“It could be that these ecosystems have moved on and achieved a new balance, and restoring extinct animals to them could actually further disrupt them or upset them again,” Bramble says. “While the goal may be noble, it may not be realistic.”  

“If we don’t check these companies, I would fully expect there to be Jurassic Park-like islands or perhaps on a smaller scale, zoos.”

He adds that the impact of being reintroduced after years may impact the welfare of the formerly extinct species – animals may be psychologically confused or even traumatised. 

“People might say we humans have led to the extinction of such an animal, so we owe it to the animal, to the species, to bring them back,” Bramble says. 

“But I think that that’s a dubious argument, because it’s only the individual members of species that have interests or welfare. And you can’t bring back individual members, you can only bring back the species in general – or something like it.” 

Hunted to extinction, brought back for entertainment

If a private company funded by celebrity backers pioneered de-extinction, would this open the door for species-level ownership? 

Bramble worries that, once pioneered, commodifying species could shift from science fiction to reality. Even if this is not the route pursued by Colossal Biosciences, another private company could seize upon the idea. 

“Fiction often issues warnings in advance that are then not headed, from outer space to AI,” Bramble says. “With these de-extinction technologies, if we don’t check these companies, I would fully expect there to be Jurassic Park-like islands or perhaps on a smaller scale, zoos.  

“But the real worry would not be the animals getting loose and wreaking havoc. The harms would be to those animals and also to us for not being more sympathetic to those animals and for allowing a perverse sort of a zoo.” 

He adds that we should not overestimate our ability to understand and improve ecosystems.  

“We need to proceed with extreme caution, and this seems like another instance of crashing through without fully understanding things. That’s something that corporations, unchecked, have a tendency to do in pursuit of profit,” Bramble says. 

Roycroft also has reservations. “My main question would be, what is the actual goal here? Why are we trying to bring back a species? To put it in a zoo and for people to look at it? 

“If we brought back a thylacine tomorrow, it would be for the enjoyment of people, rather than improving the ecosystem or to do something meaningful for conservation. 

“The real issue is that we’ve got species that are going extinct now that we’re not doing anything about.” 

Conserving what we have

Experts are divided on whether the concept of de-extinction will improve or hinder conservation.  

“There’s a worry that if we think that we can just de-extinct species, then maybe that will take pressure off us psychologically to conserve the species that we have and take care of existing ecosystems,” Bramble says. 

Roycroft says there is a long list of critically endangered and endangered Australian animals that would benefit from research funding including species monitoring, new pest control methods, and even awareness campaigns about keeping pet cats inside. 

“I would love for there to be more attention on the plight of our living species that are on the brink of extinction, species like the central rock rat, which has fewer than a hundred individuals left in the wild. And that’s just one example,” she says. 

“The conservation of many less iconic threatened species, especially insects and some plants, are very under-resourced.  

“There are many other species that have suffered massive declines in the last 250 years, since European colonisation of Australia, and with the right funding and conservation attention, we can actually do something to save them.”