By Tim Binnall
The quest to revive the Tasmanian Tiger has taken a significant step forward as, in a first when it comes to an extinct species, scientists have managed to recover the creature's RNA. The remarkable breakthrough was reportedly achieved by a team of researchers working with a 130-year-old thylacine specimen housed at the Swedish Museum of Natural History. Since RNA, or transcriptome, serves as something of an instruction manual for the information contained in DNA, the recovery of this material is critical in developing an understanding of the long-lost Tasmanian Tiger's genetic composition.
To that end, lead scientist Emilio Mármol of Stockholm University mused that "resurrecting the Tasmanian tiger or the woolly mammoth is not a trivial task, and will require a deep knowledge of both the genome and transcriptome regulation of such renowned species, something that only now is starting to be revealed." By way of their work, the scientists now have a proverbial picture of how the skin and skeletal muscles of the thylacine were genetically coded. As further study of the creature continues, it would appear to be only a matter of time before they construct the complete genetic blueprint for the animal which was declared extinct decades ago.