To the joy (and some concern) of animal lovers, Carbon Copy, or Cc’s birth could lead to a new industry, the large-scale cloning of pets.
Cc was created by a team at Texas A&M University with the backing of an American businessman, John Sperling, whose company plans to offer cloning to cat and dog owners. Mr Sperling has put $US3.7 million ($7.5 million) into cloning research in the hope a copy can eventually be made of his aging long-haired dog, Missy.
Carlie Martin, of the Australian Association for Humane Research, said the cloning of cats was an appalling development. Other cloned animals had been found to have high rates of abnormalities. And a clone could never replace a favourite pet, because each animal is an individual.
Sheep, mice, cattle, goats and pigs have been cloned, Dolly-style, by transferring the nucleus of a cell from an adult animal into a hollowed-out egg.
The success rate with cats was as low as with these animals. It took the researchers 188 tries to clone just one kitten. Cc, born two months ago, was the only live birth from 87 cloned embryos that were implanted in surrogate mothers.
"The kitten was vigorous at birth and appears to be completely normal," the scientists reported in the journal Nature, which published the research online yesterday ahead of schedule, when news of Cc's existence leaked out. CC is not an exact copy of her mother, Rainbow. Her coat is different, because the pattern of colors on multicolored animals is determined by events in the womb rather than by genes – a reminder that clones may be genetic copies of their parent but are never quite identical.
Although this kitten is as cute as a button – it does raise all sorts of ethically questions about whether it is right to re-produce animals and even humans – when we already have population explosion as it is!
Kym
Animal clone first Dolly is put down:
Dolly the sheep, the first animal to be cloned; suffered so badly from arthritis she was recently put down. Questions have been raised about whether this means that cloning leads to advanced aging. Read about Dolly's death here
Last updated: 30/04/2008
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Meet Cc - a cute ball of genetically cloned fur!
Animal clone first Dolly is put down: