Word: backings
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...reserve. But this could soon change thanks to the work of European preservationists who are hoping they can make the great beast walk again. If they succeed - through a combination of modern genetic expertise and old-fashioned breeding - it would be the first time an animal has been brought back from extinction and released into the wild...
...will more closely resemble the ancient aurochs. "Everything will be put together in a genetic mosaic," says Donato Matassino, head of the Consortium for Experimental Biotechnology in Italy and one of the scientists involved in the project. "Once we have all the roads, we'll try to follow them back to Rome." (See 10 species near extinction...
...current effort isn't the first attempt to resurrect the ancient cattle. The aurochs played an important role in early German culture, and in the early 20th century the Nazi government funded an attempt to breed them back as part of its propaganda effort. The result, known as Heck cattle, may to some extent resemble the ancient aurochs, says Kerkdijk, but they're genetically quite different. "We want a breed that resembles the aurochs, not only in phenotype, but in genotype," he says. Heck cattle, for example, are more aggressive than aurochs because they were bred, in part, using Spanish...
Other groups are also trying to bring different animals back from extinction through breeding. In South Africa, scientists are attempting to recreate the quagga, an extinct subspecies of the zebra, and in the U.S., breeders are trying to bring back a giant Galápagos tortoise that was killed off in the 1800s - a process that could take close to a century. (See "Dinosaur-Era Crocodiles Found in Sahara...
Another key will be the government he forms, assuming he ousts Tymoshenko as Prime Minister. The Russian authoritarian model is not tempting to many of the oligarchs who back Yanukovych. "They don't want to become politically dependent on Russia. They're worried they'll meet the same fate as [Mikhail] Khodorkovsky," says Viktor Nebozhenko, a political analyst in Kiev, referring to the jailed Russian tycoon...