Mammoth meatballs grown from ancient genetic information

Think we can't eat them just because they're extinct? Think again! Enterprising geneticists introduced mammoth DNA to the shmeat looms to make ancient meatballs. Voila!

This is not an April Fools joke," said Tim Noakesmith, founder of Australian startup Vow. "This is a real innovation."

Cultivated meat — also called cultured or cell-based meat — is made from animal cells. Livestock doesn't need to be killed to produce it, which advocates say is better not just for the animals but also for the environment.

Vow used publicly available genetic information from the mammoth, filled missing parts with genetic data from its closest living relative, the African elephant, and inserted it into a sheep cell, Noakesmith said. Given the right conditions in a lab, the cells multiplied until there were enough to roll up into the meatball.