Earth lost a truly unique species when Benjamin, the last known thylacine — commonly called the Tasmanian tiger — died in captivity in early September of 1936. Despite an impressive number of alleged sightings of the animal in the years since, no actual documented examples of the species have been found in the wild for nearly a century. Now, thanks to some incredible advancements in DNA research, some scientists believe we could actually bring the species back from the dead.
A new study published in Nature Ecology and Evolution announces that scientists have finally been able to obtain the complete nuclear genome of the thylacine species, revealing an impressive amount about the creature’s ancestry. According to the study, the dog-like marsupial was only very loosely related to modern day canines, having shared a common ancestor some 160 million years ago. It was an incredibly special animal, and a branch of the evolutionary tree that stood out on its own.
“They were this bizarre and singular species. There was nothing else like them in the world at the time,” one of the researchers, Charles Feigin of the University of Melbourne, Australia, explains. “They look just like a dog or wolf, but they’re a marsupial.”
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