You will have likely seen in the news recently about the ‘de-extinction of the dire wolf’, a canid species which went extinct over ten thousand years ago. Using gene editing techniques and gray wolves, Colossal Biosciences – a for-profit biotechnology company based in Dallas, Texas – claim to have restored the lost megafauna through the production of three genetically-modified wolf pups. To do this, their scientists edited a literal handful (14) genes based on those loosely identified as ‘under positive selection’ in an ancient dire wolf genome. As expected, there are several technicalities which have not been adequately covered by the resultant media fanfare (e.g., that dire wolves are equally close in evolutionary distance to coyotes, dholes and jackals as they are gray wolves). The associated pre-print (i.e., yet-to-be-peer-reviewed), featuring fantasy-writer-but-not-scientist George R. R. Martin, was published on April 11th 2025, resulting in more direct scrutiny by the scientific community.
Continue readingGenomics
How destabilization of climate threatens aquatic life in a biodiversity hotspot
In more fishy news, this week the latest (and last!) chapter of my PhD, describing how millions of years of climatic stability have allowed isolated and divergent lineages of pygmy perches to persist, was published (Open Access) in Heredity. It covers population divergence, phylogenetic relationships (including estimation of divergence times), species delimitation and projections of species distributions from the past (up to three million years ago) into the future (up to 2100). Some highlights include:
Continue readingReviving rivers: a community-led tale of fish conservation
Communities and conservation
When I was younger, I used to love visiting our local creek: it was a beautiful spot of nature a short walk from home. On a couple occasions, my Dad took me to the creek to catch yabbies – for a suburban kid, it was one of the few times I actually held and interacted with wild biodiversity, and helped foster my love for conservation and inquiry into biology. In the late 2000s to early 2010s, a likely combination of local pollution and extensive drought extirpated the yabbies from the creek – I would never see one in that creek again. I was devastated for the local loss of a fascinating creature, and the connection to nature it represented, but felt powerless to remedy the situation. To my knowledge, there are still no yabbies in that creek.
Continue readingConservation applications of functional variation
From genotype to phenotype
One fundamental aspect of conservation and evolution research is the implicit connection between genetic variation, phenotypic characteristics, and their influence on Darwinian fitness. Genetic diversity underpins many aspects of the adaptive potential of a population, and many of the fundamental concepts of the field rely on the assumed connection between genetic and phenotypic characteristics. But this connection is neither straightforward, nor always predictable.
Continue readingBuilding Blueprints – How to assemble a genome
The utility of a reference genome
In the 18 years since the completion of the Human Genome Project, the practicality of assembling full genomes for a wide range of taxa beyond ourselves has only improved. While model taxa systems have achieved genomes before many others, it is now possible for whole genomes to be assembled for a range of non-model organisms as well. But how do we assemble the genome of a species for the very first time (often de novo – literally “from the new”)? What can we do with this genome? Why is it so useful? Let’s delve into the process and outcomes of genome assembly a little more.
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The G-cat 