South Korean Scientists (so, this may be entirely made up) claim to have cloned a pet dog for the first time. This was paid for by Bernann McKinney, of California, clearly a person with too much money on her hands, who paid $50,000 for five copies of his bet Booger.
"Booger was my partner and my friend," Ms McKinney said, as she appeared with the five identical copies of her pet.Scientists at Seoul National University created a number of embryos from preserved skin cells taken from Booger's ear tissue before he died.
The embryos were then implanted into two surrogate mother dogs and, three months later, the puppies were born.
Among the scientists involved in the project was Professor Lee Byeong-chun, who was part of the team that created the world's first cloned dog - Snuppy the Afghan hound - in 2005. *
Right. Sure.
Life Science
Comments
Uh, identical? I don't think so. Like the cloned kitten, cloned puppies should have their own distinctive patterning. Of course, that could just be sloppy reporting.
Posted by: Stephanie Z | August 5, 2008 10:07 AM
Source, please?
Posted by: Deathweasel | August 5, 2008 4:10 PM
It depends. If the dog is a variegated breed, the patterns should be different, but if they're one solid colour, they should all look the same.
Posted by: wazza | August 6, 2008 2:02 AM
I'm inclined to agree with David Quammen:
Dear Birdbrain McGooney:
May I suggest a better way of spending that $50k? Give $49k of it to your local no-kill animal shelter and adopt your next pet there. Or better yet, split that money between the shelter and a nonprofit agency that provides helper animals for people with disabilities.
The result? Lots of happy animals, lots of happy people, and far fewer cranky old farts like me wishing we could ream you a new one for being such a selfish jerk.
=^..^=
Posted by: themadlolscientist, FCD | August 6, 2008 11:33 PM
Did the $50,000 cover the mid-sentence sex change too?
PS, you misspelled 'pet' 'bet'.
Posted by: llewelly | August 7, 2008 12:21 AM