My latest feature in Current Biology is about a big beast of the Pleistocene that has been extinct for almost four centuries, but is also present in the genomes of current livestock: the aurochs. A large scale study of ancient genomes has revealed the population history of the Eurasian species from which today's domestic cattle descends, and based on this wealth of information, the chances are improving to recreate an aurochs-like bovine that could serve the ecosystem services of the defunct species.
Big bovines lost and reborn
Current Biology Volume 34, Issue 23, 2 December 2024, Pages R1159-R1161
FREE access to full text and PDF download
See also my Mastodon thread where I highlighted all CB features of 2024.
The thread for 2023 is here .
Cave art at Lascaux, shown here, depicts the aurochs among other large mammals present across Europe in the Pleistocene. (Photo: JoJan/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0).)
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