How dire is the dire wolf?

Factual Questions
41

What Colossal did was make 20 edits in 14 genes in a wolf. The difference between modern wolves and extinct dire wolves is far more than 14 different alleles on existing genes. They may have created alleles that don’t currently exist in the Canis lupus * group of subspecies.

The example they give on their website is in the LCORL gene which is important in determining body size. They made some changes which result in a different protein structure, which should result in the protein behaving differently, and eventually result in a larger body size.

I see this as more a marketing hyperbole than scientific dishonesty. The did some stuff, which might be scientifically important breakthroughs, but then advertised it as bringing back the dire wolf, which this is far from doing.

Perhaps their LCORL editing information could be used to make 70 pound chihuahuas.

42

That is so true. Waiting for Netflix to produce a sci-fi series.

43

And notably, one of the things they did was change the fur color, not to match the fur color of actual dire wolves, but to match the color of the supernatural “dire wolves” from Game of Thrones.

44

Judging from some of the bulbous chihuahuas I see around here, many chihuahua owners are shooting for 70 pounds with the current genome.

45

There’s a very interesting article about this in the current New Yorker (4/14).
It compares this project and related ones to the moon landing, which was important not because the rocks we brought back were super useful but because of all the other scientific advances we had to make in order to achieve it.

The clickbait pop-culture nature of the announcement is very cringe, but they certainly acknowledge that all they’ve actually done is create an animal that phenotypically resembles a dire wolf, when questioned about it by people who know what “phenotypically” means. And although I’m sure that this technology will soon trickle down to scumbags who will use it to create designer pets for oligarchs, Colossus is clear that they won’t be doing that. The plan apparently is to create a few more “liar wolves”, sterilize them and keep them in a secure preserve until they die.

I found it interesting that they identified the gene which makes dire wolves white, found that it was associated with a high risk of blindness, and adjusted another fur pigment gene instead in order to get the white coat. (or, cynically, maybe in order to achieve the pure white coat GoT fans want, rather than just being a lighter shade of grey than grey wolves)

Putting the most optimistic spin on it, these somewhat misleading claims have successfully fooled venture capitalists into funding basic science research, which is good, because apparently the government isn’t doing that anymore. Still, it’s certainly not a GOOD thing in any way if science is moving in a direction where experimental data is “company IP”.

46

Well, I’m not sure exactly how large the wolf genome is, but I’m pretty sure changing only 20 genes is going to make them several orders of magnitude more than 98.8% grey wolf. They manipulated the genes that made it physically resemble a dire wolf, but it’s still basically a grey wolf “under the hood”, as it were.

Edit: Turns out grey wolves are already 99.5% dire wolf to start with.

47

What physical changes did they actually make, aside from the fur color?

Will we even know the full extent until an adult animal dies and is autopsied?

48

I’m sure there are lots of questions that won’t be answered until autopsy, and a lot more that won’t be answered until they reach adulthood. Theoretically as adults their muzzles and ears should be larger relative to their skulls, and their skulls larger relative to their bodies, than those of grey wolves. They’re definitely somewhat larger than grey wolves, expected to grow about 20 pounds heavier than the average grey. Still too small to ride, though :slight_smile: (and they expect them to be far too aggressive as adults to be tamed, though now as pups they’re willing to be petted by people they’ve known all their lives)

49

Dead humans get autopsied. Dead animals get necropsied.

s/
The drive-by pedant. :wink:

50

Who in their right mind would want a 70 pound Chihuahua? ( I have 2 less than 5 pounders. Thats way more than plenty.)

Surely not the police. Not the Army canine corps.
They would be impressive attack dogs.
Except for one tiny thing. They are genetically prone to bad teeth.
A fierce huge Chihuahua ain’t gonna catch many criminals with gums.

51

Now I am hearing Warren Zevon singing in a mondegreen. Thanks.

52

Apparently the fattest Chihuahua was about 25#+

53

An acquaintance of mine declared last night that, based on his residence in a particular Indiana town,, he owns a Dyer Chihuahua.

54

Apparently chihuahuas are the closest genetically to the pre-European invasion new world dogs.

55

But they’re also good for getting Money for doing Nothing…

56

Better yet, the chicks are free.

57

When I was a kid, it sometimes seemed as if there was a very limited repertoire of prehistoric animals, even though we’re talking about an immense time period, and the entire world. Granted that there were far fewer dinosaurs and Cenozoic creatures known, but there were a lot more than the relatively few we were treated to – the ones that showed up in movies and books and the like.

For example:
T. rex
Brontosaurus
Stegosaurus
Ankylosaurus
Parasaurolophus
etc.

Wooly Mammoths
Saber Tooth Tiger
Giant Ground Sloth
Baluchitherium
Wooly Rhinoceros
Mastodon

… and the Dire Wolf.

I had the Dire Wolf in my Prehistoric Stamp Book, my Prehistoric Creature Cards, plastic Dire Wolves in my Prehistoric Creature sets. I don’t recall it being in my sets of prehistoric skeletons, but it was everywhere else.

And it seemed odd – it was the only “dire” creature. There were plenty of “dino-” things, but nothing else got that “dire” adjective, no matter how “terrible” they were. There were no Dire Cats or Dire Birds or Dire Sharks, even though some of them were pretty awful in their way. Dire Wolves pretty much had the word to themselves. The only other Dire thing I knew were the Straits.

And there didn’t seem to be any other prehistoric wolves that they mentioned, although I’m sure they knew of them.

So I grew up with a childhood image of Dire Wolves as the only prehistoric wolves. Since I’m of the same vintage as George R. R. Martin, I’m sure he did, too. Which is probably why he stuck dire wolves in his Song of Ice and Fire series. And that’s purportedly the reason that they decided to try to convince people they had “de-extincted” Dire Wolves. Plus they’re cute and cuddly, when they aren’t trying to rip you to pieces.

If only they’d had Dire Kittens, or something.

Incidentally, everyone’s comparing this to Jurassic Park, but it more closely resembles Douglas Preston’s 2024 novel Extinction, in which the prehistoric theme park is filled not with dinosaurs recovered from DNA in mosquito blood, but with “de-extincted” Cenozoic mammals recovered by genetic manipulation and back-breeding of existing species to try to recover animals from a more recent era. – Wooly Mammoths, Irish Elk, Giant Sloths, etc. Of course, in this novel, too, Things Go Horribly Wrong and lots of people get killed.

People shouldn’t Pepper in God’s Lo Mein.

58

Well, there were Terror Birds. They were probably pretty terrifying.

A Terror Bird vs. a Dire Wolf would have been quite the matchup. A single wolf would probably be no match for the larger birds but a pack might be able to take one down.

59

Right – I mentioned them, but my point is that they weren’t called “Dire Birds” . In fact, one variety was Deinonychus – it had that “dino-” prefix.

60

Deinonychus was a non avian theropod dinosaur, very similar to Velociraptor but larger. “Terror birds” lived much later and are avian dinosaurs, like birds.