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14 extinct animals that could be resurrected

By: Bryan Nelson on April 22, 2012, 7:06 p.m.
Tasmanian tiger

Photo: E.J. Keller/Wikimedia Commons

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Tasmanian tiger

The Tasmanian tiger, or thylacine, native to Australia, was a remarkable animal that was the largest known carnivorous marsupial of modern times. The animals went extinct as recently as the 1930s, mostly due to the relentless efforts of bounty hunters.

Because they went extinct so recently, specimens of the animal remain intact, pickled and preserved in museum jars. Some specimens that have been stuffed and displayed in museums may also still retain DNA. Projects to clone the thylacine are already well under way, and some of the animal's genes have already been successfully expressed in a mouse fetus after the genes were inserted into the mouse's genome.