Carbon copy canine cloned

by Rachel on Aug. 05th, 2005
in Life Science

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On Wednesday, a group of scientists from Seoul National University unveiled a black and white Afghan hound named Snuppy that is genetically identical to its three-year-old "father."

Snuppy is the result of a process that involved transferring 1,095 canine embryos into 123 surrogate mothers. Only three successful pregnancies occurred. One foetus miscarried but two others were delivered; Snuppy was born on April 24 and his "brother" died from pneumonia after 22 days.

Snuppy is the latest in a series of animal cloning attempts since Dolly, the sheep cloned in 1997. Researchers have since cloned mice, cats, goats, pigs, mules, horses and deer. Dogs, however, are the most challenging of all mammals to clone, because it's difficult to acquire mature eggs. Snuppy's success makes many scientists believe that they have most of the key techniques necessary to clone humans.

The response to Snuppy? Anti-cloning activists are pushing even harder for a worldwide ban on human cloning. "Because this again shows that reproductive cloning is unsafe and inefficient, we call for a worldwide ban on human reproductive cloning, which is also unethical," says Gerald Schatten, at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Others feel optimistic that Snuppy's creation brings medicine one step closer to finding breakthrough treatments for currently-incurable human diseases. "Bring me human eggs, the necessary social consensus and legal permission and I can get you your replica within a year," said Park Se-Pill, a senior researcher of Maria Biotech and a top cloning expert.

Many diseases, for example, like diabetes, cancer, heart ailments, and problems in hips and joints, are similar in dogs and humans.

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Your Comments, Thoughts, Questions, Ideas

Anonymous says:

How exactly does cloning help us cure illnesses? I wonder if this isn't just the newest fad out there. I am inclined to think that just because science CAN do something, that doesn't always mean they SHOULD.

posted on Sun, 08/07/2005 - 12:43pm

Rachel says:

Scientists in favor of cloning believe there are numerous ways the technology could help cure illnesses. Cloning could reproduce animals with special qualities, like drug-producing animals or those that could be genetically altered to serve as models for studying human disease. Therapeutic cloning technology could someday be used to produce whole organs from single cells or produce healthy cells that can replace damaged cells in diseases like Alzheimer's or Parkinson's. Those against cloning believe there are too many moral and ethical issues involved, as well as the risk of viruses or other problems resulting from genetic manipulation.

posted on Wed, 08/10/2005 - 5:23pm

megan says:

i think that it is sad that they could do that to dogs and there could have been so many more dogs, but just becuase of someones experiment only 3 survived. that is just cruel and unhuman.

posted on Sat, 02/18/2006 - 2:15pm

Anonymous says:

Okay i have a dog and the thought of cloning him would be wierd?

posted on Sun, 09/02/2007 - 4:15pm

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