Updated
Updated · Rolling Stone · May 19
Colossal Nears Artificial Womb After 3 Dunnart Embryo Stages, Targeting Scaled De-Extinction
Updated
Updated · Rolling Stone · May 19

Colossal Nears Artificial Womb After 3 Dunnart Embryo Stages, Targeting Scaled De-Extinction

17 articles · Updated · Rolling Stone · May 19
  • Colossal said its artificial womb has supported fat-tailed dunnart embryos through all three developmental stages and bridged the stage-two-to-three transition, leaving the stage-one-to-two handoff as the main remaining hurdle.
  • The company said the system now works as a chemical-cueing problem rather than a hardware or software one, using a dialysis-like setup, real-time sensing and algorithms to deliver gases and nutrients during gestation.
  • Ben Lamm said Colossal aims to perfect the device within a year and use it to remove reliance on animal surrogates, a bottleneck for projects such as woolly mammoths and northern white rhinos.
  • Researchers outside the company said the claimed marsupial progress would be a significant achievement if confirmed, while noting post-birth support such as a synthetic pouch is still needed.
  • Beyond de-extinction, ethicists and conservation scientists said a working mammalian artificial womb could reshape endangered-species breeding and eventually raise far broader questions if related technologies move toward human use.
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