A company that is working on the "de-extinction" of the woolly mammoth is now in the process of developing a vaccine that could help save modern elephants from meeting the same fate as their cold-adapted relatives.
On Wednesday, Colossal Biosciences, which was founded by tech entrepreneur Ben Lamm and world-renowned geneticist George Church, announced it is accelerating research and development efforts to create a vaccine for a deadly disease that is the leading cause of death in captive Asian elephant calves in Asia, North America, and Europe and a major threat in the wild.
Today, there are fewer than 52,000 Asian elephants left in the wild and they are listed as endangered species on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List. The fatal hemorrhagic disease is considered a major threat to the long-term survival of these Asian elephants.
The disease affecting Asian elephants—especially younger, less immuno-developed individuals—is caused by elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus or EEHV.
"EEHV is responsible for nearly 66 percent of all Asian elephant deaths in North American zoos and a still unknown, but massively underestimated, number of wild elephants," Matt James, Colossal's head of animal operations, told Newsweek.
"Since this virus is latent, it can lie dormant for years before reactivating and causing clinical illness and death, making detection and treatment very challenging."
To advance the development of a vaccine, Colossal has partnered with Paul Ling, a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Virology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.
"Colossal is very excited to be collaborating with Paul Ling of the Baylor College of Medicine," Lamm told Newsweek. "Dr. Ling is the world's foremost expert on EEHV and has single-handedly saved more elephants than we'll ever know through his innovations in creating viral detection assays that allow us to treat elephants before they every shows symptoms of illness."
"This collaboration, which began earlier this year, allows Colossal to provide funding and functional expertise to Dr. Ling's lab that will accelerate his on-going development and production of a protein subunit vaccine."
Ling's lab has identified specific proteins from the EEHV virus that Colossal says it can engineer into a vaccine. This shot will train the elephant's immune system to mount a defense against the pathogen.
In addition, Colossal is working with Ling to develop a "second generation" EEHV vaccine based on similar mRNA technologies to the Pfizer and Moderna COVID shots.
"These vaccines deliver a piece of messenger RNA to the elephant's cells that will cause the cells to produce proteins specific to the EEHV virus and train the elephant's immune response to produce antigens to protect against the virus," James said.
Colossal is also developing a monoclonal antibody treatment that will be designed to provide lifesaving antibodies to critically ill elephants.
"As we know, vaccines are highly effective but rarely perfect so it is important to us that we provide elephants with every tool possible to beat this horrible disease," James said.
"Dr. Ling's work to better understand EEHV and pursue treatment and prevention solutions has been underway for several years, and we are happy to share that the synergies of our collaboration will accelerate the development of these technologies and, once rolled out, immediately begin saving elephants," he said. "Dr. Ling's research is the foundation for the current understanding of EEHV and an associated vaccine and has inspired others to also pursue this effort, including a lab in Europe that is working on a solution in parallel."
All three extant elephant species—Asian, African forest and African savanna—are endangered and the issues they face cannot be solved through a single solution, James said.
"Elephants face massive anthropogenic pressures including poaching, urban development, habitat fragmentation, and human-elephant conflict. These pressures, when compounded with natural pressures such as disease, have put elephants in very precarious position."
"We are excited to be committed to eradicating EEHV as a pressure, but we are also developing a partner network of the world's leading elephant conservation organizations. These amazing organizations are working on a wide array of projects such as rescuing and re-releasing orphaned elephants, understanding elephant behavior to better equip conservation efforts, and providing wildlife officials with tools to prevent wildlife crime."
Colossal had previously started working on the "de-extinction" of the woolly mammoth—an effort that aims to create a genetically modified hybrid elephant with mammoth traits and eventually introduce it to the Arctic tundra.
"The living populations of Asian elephants are critical for the restoration of the woolly mammoth, but more importantly, for the preservation of the elephant lineage. We're thrilled to advance science to benefit both existing and future generations of elephants and mammoths," Justin Quinn, Colossal's director of product development, said in a statement.
In August, the company announced that it was also working on the de-extinction of the iconic thylacine, better known as the Tasmanian tiger.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Aristos is a Newsweek science reporter with the London, U.K., bureau. He reports on science and health topics, including; animal, ... Read more
To read how Newsweek uses AI as a newsroom tool, Click here.
