Fireside Chat, Interview
Colossal Biosciences’ Ben Lamm sees ‘de-extinction’ as vital to fighting climate change
- Predicts a loss of up to 50% of all global biodiversity between now and 2050, creating a crisis context for conservation efforts.
- Plans to use genetic engineering, specifically computational biology and CRISPR gene editing, to resurrect species including the woolly mammoth, thylacine, and dodo bird to teach about biodiversity and enable rewilding.
- Aims to reintroduce approximately 50 traits to the woolly mammoth, such as cold tolerance down to negative 40 degrees and specific nerve functions, to ensure Arctic survival.
- Forecasts bringing thousands of Arctic-adapted mammoths back within the coming decades, though noting that true rewilding into the Arctic is more than a decade away.
- Intends to work with indigenous groups, private landowners, and governments to rewild species in North Dakota, Alaska, and the broader Arctic Circle.
- Expects rewilding cold-tolerant megafauna at specific population densities could lower ground temperatures by up to eight degrees and that rewilding nine species could offset more carbon than all human automobile and transportation usage.
- Anticipates a carbon market growth to $2.4 trillion over the next seven years, with successful rewilding modeling in Alaska and Canada generating billions in annual annuities.
- Develops a business model involving government subsidies, ecotourism, and biodiversity credits to create country-defining packages while pioneering multiplex genome editing.
- Plans to spin out a computational biology platform expected to reach seven figures in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) and grow through partnerships with biotech entities and investors.
- Explores monetizing technologies developed for artificial wombs and embryo development for potential human applications, while maintaining a strict ban on human germline editing.
- Acknowledges that other nations are advancing germline editing faster than the United States and anticipates societal eventual acceptance after testing in plants and animals.
- Identifies that the company is not working on dinosaurs and notes the woolly mammoth is only the first announced species, with the thylacine and dodo bird following as the next targets.
- Plans to perform significantly more edits on the thylacine's small marsupial genome and has established an avian genomics group specifically for the dodo bird project.
- Engages with regulatory agencies and public town halls to navigate rewilding concerns regarding invasive species and plans to launch a youth board to gather future perspectives.