Colossal and US Government Create Endangered Species ‘BioVault’

The US government is affiliated with a Texas de-extinction company Colossal Bioscience building a national database of genetic material from endangered and threatened species. The effort comes as the Trump administration seeks to weaken protections for endangered species, including a recent decision to halt the expansion of offshore oil and gas drilling.

In collaboration with the US Fish and Wildlife Service, scientists aim to collect cells, reproductive tissue, and DNA from more than 2,300 species of plants and animals in the US and around the world that are protected under the Endangered Species Act. The samples will be stored and stored at Colossal’s lab in Dallas, with duplicate samples distributed across the country.

The company, which last year said it had they made live wolf pupswill perform genetic sequencing on the samples and make the data available to researchers and conservationists. Under the agreement, the federal government will have models.

“We want to preserve as many species as possible,” says Colossal CEO and co-founder Ben Lamm.

Colossal is providing collection equipment for its partners to collect blood, skin, and other tissue samples. Lamm says the collection has already begun.

“This collaboration brings together the scientific expertise of the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the wisdom of the private sector to develop new tools that will help restore species, conserve valuable genetic material, and strengthen the future of wildlife conservation,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement. (Fish and Wildlife, which is part of the Department of the Interior, did not respond to a request for more information about the agreement.)

In theory, these models could be used to save endangered species. Fish and Wildlife did just that when they cloned the black-footed ferret — one of North America’s most endangered mammals — using the stored cells of a ferret that died in the 1980s. Announced in 2021, it was the first time an endangered species was cloned in the US. The Frozen Zoo at the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance provided an example of this work.

Under the Trump administration, Fish and Wildlife has proposed major changes to the landmark 1973 Endangered Species Act that would restore protections for endangered plants and animals. The proposed changes it would lead to considerations of economic and national security by identifying protected habitats and ending the “hard-line rule” that only provides strict protections similar to those of endangered species.

Earlier this year, President Donald Trump called in the so-called God Squad – a group of federal officials that includes Burgum – to see if they can bypass the protection of endangered species in the Gulf of Mexico. The group, which has met only a few times since the Endangered Species Act was enacted, decided to grant an exemption to oil and gas drillers in the area. (Environmentalists sued the authorities at the election.)

Noah Greenwald, director of endangered species at the Center for Biological Diversity, an Arizona-based nonprofit, says Colossal’s actions align with what regulators see as conservation efforts, in part because they don’t conflict with corporate interests.

“This is not environmental protection,” he says. “This is like a last-ditch effort. We will only need this genetic material if the authorities fail to restore the endangered species.”

The Center for Biological Diversity has been opposing proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act. Greenwald says conservation efforts should focus on protecting public spaces such as national parks and wilderness areas to prevent species loss. Even if it were possible to bring back extinct or near-extinct species with technology, he said, there would need to be habitat for those species to exist.