You need to do more than thaw

摘要

Making a nucleus will be difficu why bother if some are already lying around? Some argue that finding frozen mammoth cells that have well-preserved nuclei is the obvious starting point for making a mammoth. In Japan, scientists have recently succeeded in cloning mice from cells that had been frozen for 16 years. This led them to venture that "nuclear-transfer techniques could be used to 'resurrect' animals... from tissues frozen for prolonged periods without any cryopreservation". They mentioned mammoths specifically in this context. But those who work with ancient DNA on a daily basis are unconvinced. Sixteen years in a -20 ℃ laboratory freezer is a poor substitute for ten millennia or more lying in permafrost - and who knows how long unfrozen before that?