Scientists hope to revive the extinct Tasmanian Tiger

Researchers in the US and Australia is embarking on a multi-million dollar project to bring the Tasmanian tiger back from extinction.

The last known Tasmanian tiger was officially called thylacine, and it died in the 1930s. The scientists behind the bid said it could be recreated using gene-editing technology and stem cells. The first baby thylacine could be reintroduced to the wild in approximately ten years. However, other experts are skeptical and say de-extinction is science-fiction.

The thylacine got its nickname of Tasmanian tiger for the stripes along its back. The strips were a marsupial, the type of Australian mammal that raises its young in a pouch. The US and Australian scientists plan to take stem cells from a living marsupial species with similar DNA. They plan to use gene-editing technology to revive the extinct species or an extremely close approximation of it.

If scientists succeeded in reviving the Tasmanian tiger, it would mark the first "de-extinction" event in history. The idea of bringing back the animal has been around for more than 20 years. This latest project is a partnership between Texas-based company Colossal and scientists at the University of Melbourne.