Remember those fierce, loyal dire wolves from Game of Thrones? Well, real-life science just went full fantasy. A company called Colossal Biosciences claims it’s brought the legendary dire wolf back from extinction—10,000 years after they vanished.
They’ve introduced three adorable pups named Romulus, Remus, and Khaleesi. Born using some next-level gene-editing wizardry, these pups aren’t exact clones, but they’re about 99.5% genetically similar to real dire wolves. Basically, they’ve got the look and attitude.
So how did they do it? Scientists reconstructed the dire wolf genome from fossil DNA dating back over 11,000 years. They then spliced this ancient DNA into surrogate dogs using modern gene-editing tools. Boom—pups with prehistoric vibes.
Colossal is calling it a massive leap for science, conservation, and the future of de-extinction. “It’s proof our end-to-end tech works,” said co-founder Ben Lamm. Romulus and Remus were born in October 2024, and Khaleesi joined the pack in January 2025.
But not everyone’s ready to howl in celebration. Experts told New Scientist that these pups aren’t technically full dire wolves. Because of a few billion DNA base pairs that didn’t match exactly, some scientists say it’s more of a remix than a resurrection.
Still, Colossal stands by the science. “If it looks like a dire wolf, then we’re calling it a dire wolf,” said geneticist Beth Shapiro, adding there are no plans to breed the animals.
Fiction may have inspired this move, but science seems determined to blur the line between imagination and reality.
