Chicks hatch from artificial egg as US company aims to revive extinct species

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON, May 22 (Reuters) – A U.S. company said more than two dozen healthy chicks hatched from an artificial egg platform it developed in what it sees as a crucial step in its plan to bring back the South Island giant moa, a large flightless bird from New Zealand that went extinct centuries ago.

The announcement was made this week by Colossal Biosciences, a company dedicated to “de-extinction” – ‌resurrecting extinct species. The moa is one of two birds – the dodo being the other – among six species in its portfolio to be reborn, guided by ancient DNA. The company said last year that it had genetically modified the dire wolf, an extinct Ice Age predator.

“Using our system, we hatched 26 chicks and we are now actively monitoring these birds as they grow,” Ben Lamm, CEO and co-founder of Colossal, told Reuters.

The chicks hatched at Colossal’s headquarters in Dallas, Lamm said.

The artificial egg platform involves a bioengineered silicone-based membrane placed inside a rigid external structure. The membrane was designed to mimic the gas exchange function of an eggshell, allowing the embryonic bird to breathe oxygen by regulating the movement of gases and moisture.

“The technology is designed to closely replicate the conditions of a natural egg to produce healthy animals with normal development, fertility and longevity. This is particularly important for species like the moa, whose eggs were far larger than those of any living bird, making traditional surrogate approaches impractical,” Lamm said.

Through cloning, the Dire Wolf Project embryos were created from modified gray wolf cells, and these were implanted into surrogate domestic dog mothers. But no existing avian species is large enough to lay a football-sized South Island giant moa egg.

The moa, which measured about 3.6 meters tall, became extinct about 500 years ago, largely due to human hunting. The emu, a large flightless bird from Australia that can grow to about 1.8 meters tall, is its closest living relative.

“To hatch a Giant South Island Moa, Colossal needs a way to gestate the embryo. There is no live substitute large enough to lay a South Island Moa egg, as they are about eight times larger than an emu egg,” Lamm said.

Lamm described how the artificial egg process works.

“The process begins with a fertilized avian embryo, similar to the early stages of development inside a natural egg. The embryo and yolk are then transferred into Colossal’s artificial egg platform, designed to replicate key functions of a natural egg shell and incubation environment, including gas exchange, humidity regulation, temperature stability and developmental support,” Lamm said.

“As the embryo develops, the system provides continuous environmental control and supplementation where necessary – for example, calcium support during skeletal growth, which would normally come from the natural shell. Because the embryo develops visibly above the yolk, researchers can follow its development in real time throughout embryogenesis,” said Lamm, the process by which a fertilized egg develops into an embryo.

For the 26 chicks, the “total development time from embryo transfer to hatching was approximately 21 days, which corresponds to normal development of the species, Lamm said.

This artificial egg platform, Lamm said, could be useful in the conservation of endangered bird species. It’s also an important step toward the return of the moa, Lamm said.

“Other obstacles include the need to reconstruct an accurate moa genome from ancient DNA, identify the genetic basis of key moa traits, and translate these traits into a closely related living species such as the emu,” Lamm said.

“At Colossal, the project is currently in the genome sequencing phase,” Lamm said, focused on building high-quality genomes for this and the eight other extinct moa species. “So far, the team has identified several sources of ancient and powerful DNA, including samples from the South Island giant moa.”

(Reporting by Will Dunham; editing by Daniel Wallis)