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One of the world’s most important nature groups is weighing a call for a moratorium on allowing genetically engineered plants or animals, such as canines edited to appear like extinct “dire wolves,” from being released into the wild.

Advocates for the temporary ban, which is being considered at a meeting of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), worry about the dangers of engineered organisms upending nature. The consequences of any misstep, they say, may be uncontainable and irreversible.

“We need to put funding towards nature conservation strategies that we know work and not trying to bring back animals that don’t exist,” said Joann Sy, a scientific adviser to a Paris-based conservation group called Pollinis, a lead sponsor of the moratorium. But opponents of the proposal say that beyond “de-extinction” efforts, synthetic biology holds great untapped potential to save nature, not hurt it. Such a blanket ban, even if temporary, only threatens to drive more plants and animals to the brink, they say.