The Gene Explained | A Big Wooly Gene
In this episode, we delve into the difficulties of resurrecting extinct animals.
From
The Gene Explained | A Big Wooly Gene
Special | 3mVideo has Closed Captions
In this episode, we delve into the difficulties of resurrecting extinct animals.
In the format of a cooking show, this episode delves into the difficulties of resurrecting extinct animals from remnant DNA. While the science fiction is famous, the reality is more complex and maybe impossible, but the science behind why it will likely stay science fiction is revealing.
From
Funding for KEN BURNS PRESENTS THE GENE: AN INTIMATE HISTORY has been provided by Genentech, 23andMe, Cancer Treatment Centers of America, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Gray Foundation, American Society of...
The Gene Explained | A Big Wooly Gene
Special | 3mVideo has Closed Captions
In the format of a cooking show, this episode delves into the difficulties of resurrecting extinct animals from remnant DNA. While the science fiction is famous, the reality is more complex and maybe impossible, but the science behind why it will likely stay science fiction is revealing.
From
How to Watch The Gene
The Gene is available to stream on pbs.org and the free PBS App, available on iPhone, Apple TV, Android TV, Android smartphones, Amazon Fire TV, Amazon Fire Tablet, Roku, Samsung Smart TV, and Vizio.
Buy Now
The Gene Explained
What the heck is a gene, anyway? This animated series won’t get you a PhD, but it does clear up a few mysteries about how genes work and what they might look like in the future. (Microscope not required.)More from This Collection
The Gene Explained | The Gene That Transformed
Video has Closed Captions
What terrifying things go on inside of chrysalis, and what dark role do genes play? (3m 9s)
The Gene Explained | Is That a Banana in Your Genes?
Video has Closed Captions
Humans are indeed genetically related to bananas (as well as slugs), but how exactly? (3m 21s)
The Gene Explained | Invasion of the Gene Snatchers
Video has Closed Captions
How do viruses work? Sort of like an alien invasion that replaces our cell’s genetic code. (3m 1s)
The Gene Explained | Gene Damage
Video has Closed Captions
What goes on in our DNA to make us grow grey hair, wrinkles and less than healthy DNA? (3m 25s)
The Gene Explained | What the Gene Is That?
Video has Closed Captions
See how scientists are expanding the DNA alphabet & what to look for in the search for E.T (3m 6s)
The Gene Explained | Super Gene
Video has Closed Captions
See what happens if DNA code gets deleted, put in the wrong place, or switched. (2m 58s)
The Gene Explained | Good Genes Gone Bad
Video has Closed Captions
What causes cancer and ways to calm down those "good genes that have gone bad." (2m 58s)
The Gene Explained | Gene Whiz! It's a Boy!
Video has Closed Captions
If you're curious about the origin of boys, look no further than the Y chromosome. (2m 49s)
The Gene Explained | Gene Strike!
Video has Closed Captions
Take a peek into the body's war room during the heat of battle with cancer. (2m 24s)
The Gene Explained | Gene Filled Donuts
Video has Closed Captions
How DNA's mysterious instructions buried in a gene become the actual nose on a face. (2m 14s)
Providing Support for PBS.org
Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorship(audience clapping) - Welcome back, folks.
I got the king of protein for you today.
It's meaty, it's hairy, it's 10,000 years old.
Mammuthus primigenius, or like Grandma used to make, wooly mammoth cobbler.
Mm-mmm!
You remember sitting around the cave with the family once a year to get a little scoop of that wooly, and a steaming heap of mammoth.
Well today, I'm gonna show you how to get that mammoth in your mouth.
That's right.
(audience laughing) Okay, we've got all the ingredients here.
We're just missing one, the wooly mammoth.
So let's head up to the nearest glacier with an ice pick and whack us out a mammoth flank.
Here's the problem with that, frozen, not fresh.
We don't cook that way.
So we're gonna have to make our mammoth from scratch.
First let's sequence that mammoth genome.
Gather up a piece of mammoth that paleontologists have found.
Toss it into this absurdly capable pressure cooker for a while.
(chef humming) No, a little while longer.
That's better.
There we have it!
The mammoth genome.
Now it doesn't look like much, but it's full of mammoth flavor.
Next, we're gonna need a couple of things from this elephant here.
A skin cell and an egg.
First, we slurp out all of the elephant DNA from that elephant skin cell nucleus, so we can put in the mammoth DNA.
And then we'll yonk out the nucleus of the egg, slip in our creation from the skin cell, and slap the whole thing back inside that elephant to cook for about, oh, two years.
(calm music) Oh yeah, that is smelling like something that doesn't smell too good.
It smells a little like the DNA didn't get switched on to do its work on the cell.
Well, that's the tricky part.
Like Meemaw used to say, DNA's easy to put in, but tough to switch on.
(audience laughs) Well, let's plate this up and see how it tastes.
(audience screeching) Oh, mm, yeah, that is rancid.
Well, you get the basic idea.
We might need to wait a bit for science to catch up before we make a mammoth.
Next week, the dunkleosteus casserole.
That's gonna be dunkle-o-licious.
(jazzy music)
Funding for KEN BURNS PRESENTS THE GENE: AN INTIMATE HISTORY has been provided by Genentech, 23andMe, Cancer Treatment Centers of America, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Gray Foundation, American Society of...