Ideas change everything

Bring back the woolly mammoth!

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Hendrik Poinar |

TEDxDeExtinction

• March 2013

It’s the dream of kids all around the world to see giant beasts walk the Earth again. Could -- and should -- that dream be realized? Hendrik Poinar talks about the next big thing: the quest to engineer a creature that looks very much like our furry friend, the woolly mammoth. The first step, to sequence the woolly genome, is nearly complete. And it’s huge.

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Want to use TED Talks in your organization?

It’s the dream of kids all around the world to see giant beasts walk the Earth again. Could -- and should -- that dream be realized? Hendrik Poinar talks about the next big thing: the quest to engineer a creature that looks very much like our furry friend, the woolly mammoth. The first step, to sequence the woolly genome, is nearly complete. And it’s huge.

Want to use TED Talks in your organization?

This talk was presented to a local audience at TEDxDeExtinction, an independent event. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

Read more about TEDx.

About the speaker

Evolutionary geneticist

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Hendrik Poinar is a geneticist and biological anthropologist who focuses on extracting ancient DNA. He currently has his sights set on sequencing the genome of the woolly mammoth -- and cloning it.

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This talk was presented to a local audience at TEDxDeExtinction, an independent event. TED's editors chose to feature it for you.

Read more about TEDx.