Fireside Chat, Interview
Colossal Biosciences’ Ben Lamm sees ‘de-extinction’ as vital to fighting climate change
- Company Mission & Scope: Colossal Biosciences, co-founded by CEO Ben Lamb and scientist George Church, is a biotechnology firm focused on "de-extinction" to address the projected loss of 50% of global biodiversity by 2050.
- Primary Objective: The company aims to use genetic engineering to restore extinct species, not merely as a novelty, but as a mechanism to teach the public about the biodiversity crisis and subsidize global conservation technologies.
- First Target Species: The Woolly Mammoth is the first announced species for rewilding, chosen for its potential to combat climate change in the Arctic; no work is being done on dinosaurs.
- Scientific Methodology: The process involves using the modern Asian elephant (99.6% genetically similar to mammoths) as a surrogate, employing CRISPR to introduce approximately 50 specific traits related to cold tolerance, fur, and physiology.
- Genetic Editing Scale: Colossal is pioneering "multiplex editing," editing multiple genome locations simultaneously to minimize off-target effects, a capability largely unavailable in the industry 10–15 years ago.
- Beyond Phenotype: The edited mammoths are engineered for functional survival, including hemoglobin adaptations for breathing at -40°C and nerve ending sensitivity, ensuring they can sustain Arctic rewilding.
- Rewilding Strategy: The company intends to reintroduce these animals to the Arctic (North America, Europe, Asia) to lower ground temperatures by up to 8°C, leveraging the fact that permafrost stores more carbon than the atmosphere.
- Climate Impact Data: Research suggests that reintroducing nine specific megafauna species could offset more carbon than all global human automobile and transportation usage combined.
- Economic Model: Colossal operates as a for-profit entity with a revenue model based on long-term "annuities" from carbon credits, biodiversity credits, ecotourism, and government subsidies, forecasting a carbon market growth to $2.4 trillion over seven years.
- Funding Status: The company has raised $225 million from long-term investors (including Thomas Tull and Jim Breyer) who recognized the intersection of biotech and climate solutions.
- Commercial Diversification: Beyond conservation, Colossal has spun out a computational biology platform that secured $30 million in funding and generates seven figures in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR).
- Technology Spin-offs: Innovations in artificial wombs (ex-utero development) and hydrogel microfluidics are being developed with potential immediate applications in human medicine and IVF.
- Second & Third Species: The Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger) is the next target to fill an ecological void regarding apex predation and disease regulation in Australia; the Dodo is the subsequent target, requiring the company to build a new avian genomics group.
- Project Synergy: The Thylacine project serves as an inverse technical challenge to the Mammoth project (e.g., high edit count vs. low edit count, short gestation vs. long gestation), allowing the company to refine its editing systems across different biological constraints.
- Stakeholder Engagement: The company actively collaborates with Indigenous groups (specifically in North Dakota, Alaska, and the Arctic Circle), government bodies (including the Alaska Department of Fish and Game), and private landowners to ensure successful rewilding.
- Ethical Stance: While Colossal performs germline editing in animals to create permanent species changes, it explicitly bans human germline editing, advocating for global regulation rather than a total moratorium.
- Regulatory Philosophy: Ben Lamb acknowledges that other nations are advancing human germline editing faster than the US; he argues society must regulate these tools cautiously rather than fear them, drawing parallels to gene-blocking drugs currently in use.
- Team Composition: The workforce is highly interdisciplinary, including geneticists, geologists, environmental analysts, and elephant conservationists, recruited to solve problems none of them individually could master.
- Advisory Boards: In response to feedback, the company established a conservation board, an executive advisory board, and is launching a youth board to incorporate diverse perspectives on long-term ecological impact.
- Capital Raising Challenges: Early funding required overcoming skepticism from both traditional biotech investors (who lacked climate knowledge) and impact investors (who questioned biological feasibility).
- Founder's Motivation: Ben Lamb transitioned from software and defense sectors after identifying the Woolly Mammoth project as the "greatest thing" in synthetic biology, driven by curiosity and a desire to tackle "hard" problems.
- Future Outlook: The goal is to reintroduce thousands of Arctic-adapted mammoths within the coming decades, viewing de-extinction as one thread in a broader tapestry of nature-based climate solutions.