While dinosaur cloning is still confined to the realm of science fiction, the company that created Mammoth Meatballs is working on creating T. Rex leather. Scientists have yet to discover an insect entombed in amber to use in creating a dinosaur theme park, but collagen fragments have been extracted from 68-million-year-old fossils of Tyrannosaurus Rex.
VML has partnered with the Organoid Company, a genomic engineering company, and Lab-Grown Leather Ltd., a sustainable biotechnology company, to reconstruct T. Rex protein sequences and create living cells. Those cells will be used to grow skin that Lab-Grown Leather claims is "structurally and genetically identical to traditional leather." The initial market for the leather products is the "luxury market," which implies that the cost will be substantial.
This bears a striking resemblance to recent claims of de-extinction for the dire wolf. While there is very interesting science being done here, whatever they end up making will not be T. Rex leather. Lab-Grown Leather uses very careful wording in its description:
These cells — cultivated and structured using Elemental X™ — will be developed into 100% real leather, carrying the unique biological signature of a 66-million-year-old T.rex.
Claiming to make T. Rex leather is great PR and could provide a revenue stream to fund the sustainable and cruelty-free lab-grown leather the company is already making. Still, it's another example of scientific reality diverging from PR hype.
Previously:
• First lab-grown chicken nuggets on restaurant menu
• De Beers to sell lab-made diamonds as gemstones
• Lab-grown blood injected into live human beings for the first time
• Florida lawmakers criminalize the production, sale, and distribution of lab-grown meat
