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Colossal Biosciences—
Dire wolf
Courtesy of Colossal Biosciences · Press kit, editorial use (opens colossal.com)

Dire wolf

by Colossal BiosciencesUS

ProtoStage 2 of 5

Three edited pups live on a private preserve; more animals planned.

Updated 7 Apr 2025Checked 25 Sep0 updates this week

Milestones

No announced next step
  1. Romulus and Remus bornOct 2024Complete.
  2. Khaleesi bornJan 2025Complete.
  3. Public announcement7 Apr 2025Complete.

Most important updates

  • 7 Apr 2025

Physics limits

  • A few edits can't recreate a speciesDire and gray wolves differ at millions of DNA letters. 20 edits change looks, but not the full biology, behaviour or gut microbes of the extinct animal.
  • Cloning is inefficientMoving a nucleus into an egg often fails to reprogram it properly; most cloned embryos don't make it to birth, so many eggs and surrogates are needed per animal.
  • Behaviour isn't in the genes aloneWolves learn hunting and social behaviour from their pack. Animals raised by people can't learn how their extinct counterparts lived.

How it works

3 parts
Dire wolf skulls from the La Brea tar pits: ancient bones like these are where dire wolf DNA is read from
Dire wolf skulls from the La Brea tar pits: ancient bones like these are where dire wolf DNA is read fromPhoto: Bill Abbott · CC BY-SA 2.0 (opens commons.wikimedia.org)
Read

DNA from old bones

Colossal sequenced ancient DNA from a dire wolf tooth about 13,000 years old and a skull about 72,000 years old.

Edit

20 edits in gray wolf cells

Gray wolf cells from blood were edited at 14 genes to change size, coat and colour toward dire wolf traits.

Clone

Dogs as surrogates

Edited nuclei were placed in dog egg cells, and the embryos carried by domestic dog surrogate mothers.

Papers & demos

1 item
  1. Apr 2025paper
    On the ancestry and evolution of the extinct dire wolf (preprint) (opens doi.org)Colossal's analysis of the dire wolf genome behind its edit choices.

Update log

1 update

Mon 7 Apr 2025

  • Major: PressResearch

About Colossal Biosciences

The team behind Dire wolf

Colossal Biosciences

De-extinction, dire wolf, woolly mammoth

Dallas company co-founded by Ben Lamm and George Church that edits living animals to carry traits of extinct ones: mammoth, thylacine, dodo, moa. In 2025 it announced wolf pups edited with dire wolf traits and 'woolly mice'.

  • Apr 2025: announced three pups cloned from gray wolf cells with 20 edits in 14 genes chosen from ancient dire wolf DNA.
  • Many scientists, including the IUCN wolf and dog experts, say they are modified gray wolves, not dire wolves.
  • Reported in Jul 2026 to be raising at a $20–30B valuation, up from $10.2B in Jan 2025.

colossal.com (opens colossal.com)Company profile →

Founded
20215 yrs
Headquarters
United States
Status
Private
Valuation
$10BprivateJan 2025
Raised
$350M2 rounds
Last round
Series C · $200MJan 2025$10B post
Works in
BiotechDe-extinction
Coverage
2 programs · 7 updateslatest 1 Jul 2026checked 25 Sep
Lead investors
TWG GlobalUS Innovative Technology Fund
Partners
Form Bio (opens formbio.com)University of Melbourne (opens unimelb.edu.au)
Investors
TWG Global
People
Ben Lamm (opens en.wikipedia.org)Co-founder and CEOGeorge Church (opens en.wikipedia.org)Co-founderBeth Shapiro (opens en.wikipedia.org)Chief Science Officer
Primer