Scientists are now preparing to revive the Indian cheetah. Once celebrated as the fastest land animal, the Indian cheetah vanished from the country in 1952, mainly because of excessive hunting and habitat destruction. Today, cheetahs mainly live in African countries like South Africa, Namibia, and Botswana.

Colossal Biosciences recently made headlines by creating three dire wolf pups using ancient DNA, cloning, and advanced gene-editing tools. Motivated by this, Indian scientists are now working on bringing the extinct Indian cheetah back to life.

The Lucknow-based Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences (BSIP) has joined hands with the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) for this groundbreaking initiative. According to The Times of India, BSIP is almost done with the whole genome sequencing (WGS) of the Indian cheetah. This means they are studying every bit of the animal’s DNA to understand its genetic makeup.

How will it work?

The revival plan includes an interesting twist, using an African cheetah as a surrogate mother. “We have samples of all extinct Indian cheetahs, and we are now in the final phase of their whole genome sequencing,” said Niraj Rai, a senior scientist at BSIP who is leading the research. “This will help us identify any genetic changes that may have caused diseases and eventually led to their extinction.”

Once the sequencing is complete, likely in the next three months, the scientists will compare the DNA of the Indian and African cheetahs. “Thereafter, we will make changes in the DNA of the African cheetah; this will be done to make it India-specific,” Rai added.

The project will involve gene editing, where scientists carefully change the DNA of an African cheetah to match the extinct Indian one. Once that's ready, the Indian cheetah could be brought back to life through surrogacy.

 

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