Colossal Biosciences Launches Partnership with Elephant Havens Wildlife Foundation to Develop New Models Using AI

Colossal Biosciences team at Elephant Havens in Botswana, Africa. From left to right: Steve Metzler, Matt James, Dr. Wendy Kiso.

Colossal Biosciences, the world’s first de-extinction company, has announced an integrated partnership with Elephant Havens Wildlife Foundation, the only elephant orphanage in Botswana, to establish a new model playbook for reintroducing orphan elephants back into the wild.

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“Our mission is to preserve elephants and their habitats, educate the public and establish creative solutions that closely align with the pioneering work of Colossal”

Built on the edge of the Okavango Delta in Botswana, Elephant Havens offers high-quality, tailored care to abandoned and orphaned elephants until they can be reintroduced into the wild. In a new initiative, Colossal has teamed up with Elephant Havens to implement a technologically-informed approach to elephant care and reintroduction methods. As part of this initiative, Colossal will deploy artificial intelligence (AI) technology to enable comparative analysis between the behaviors of orphaned elephants and those observed in wild elephants.

This approach, using AI to analyze video data, allows for an in-depth study of elephant herd dynamics. It is our expectation that this innovative use of technology will illuminate additional behavioral markers, providing invaluable insights that can inform more effective reintroduction strategies.

As part of an ongoing initiative to delve into the population genomics of elephants, Colossal will be performing genomic sequencing on all elephants at Elephant Havens. Colossal aims to monitor and periodically measure specific traits of interest at established stages of the elephants’ development. This will help generate a comprehensive dataset that facilitates cross-population comparisons and assists in identifying gene-trait correlations, providing valuable insights into their biology and behavior.

“Colossal is committed to uncovering innovative opportunities for species preservation, and as a keystone species that contributes to the vitality and biodiversity of their ecosystems, it’s imperative elephants remain a core focus of these efforts,” said Matt James, Chief Animal Officer at Colossal Biosciences. “This partnership not only provides an opportunity to establish a better paradigm for reintroducing elephant herds, but will allow us to build a detailed understanding of elephant calf physical and social development. We couldn’t be more grateful to Elephant Havens for their collaboration.”

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“Our mission is to preserve elephants and their habitats, educate the public and establish creative solutions that closely align with the pioneering work of Colossal,” said Debra Stevens, Co-Founder of Elephant Havens.“Because elephants have an inherent need for community connection, orphaned elephants have been reported to perish from grief without attachment to their family unit, whether that’s other herd members or humans. Reintroducing these orphans is therefore a requirement of their preservation, and we are honored to innovate the existing approaches to elephant conservation and reintroduction with Colossal’s impressive team.”

This partnership will establish a reintroduction paradigm, which will be vital for Colossal’s future endeavors as the company aims to reintroduce species including the woolly mammoth back into the Arctic. Specifically, the outputs from this partnership will help to inform rewilding strategies for Colossal’s first mammoth herds. In 2021, Colossal first announced plans to bring back and eventually rewild the mammoth back into the Arctic.

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