Attack Of The Clones: Fresh Warnings About Replication

CLONE AGE

united we stand

China says first cloned panda could be born within 1-2 years
Beijing (AFP) May 24, 2002 - A panda embryo based on a rabbit egg and inserted into a cat's uterus is among experiments that will help China breed its first panda clone in the next one or two years, state media said Friday.

The optimistic forecast comes after a series of breakthroughs in technologies aimed at cloning the endangered species, the Star Daily said, citing Chen Dayuan, one of China's best known biologists.

Scientists led by Chen successfully placed a panda embryo in the uterus of a surrogate cat mother and are now patiently waiting to see what will happen.

"We're still not sure what problems may emerge as the embryo grows bigger," Chen said according to the paper. "But we're looking forward to seeing the first cloned panda being born."

The cloning technology is based on the idea of introducing the cells of a dead female panda into the egg cells of a rabbit.

It was first reported as early as three years ago, but one of the main challenges has been to find suitable surrogate mothers.

Chinese scientists have been forced to look to other species for surrogate mothers as female pandas themselves have had difficulties completing pregnancies.

Panda cloning has been the subject of considerable controversy in China, as some scientists claim it is unnecessary.

The real threat to the panda is not its lack of breeding capabilities, or a low interest in sex, but the threat mankind poses to its natural habitat, they have argued.

There are only an estimated 1,000 pandas living in the wild.

by Richard Ingham
Paris (AFP) May 26, 2002
Fresh evidence emerged Sunday about the perils of cloning, amid claims by rogue scientists that the first human replicant may be born just months from now.

Research published in the journal Nature Genetics highlighted abnormalities among cloned animals which powerfully back fears that a cloned child could die in infancy or be condemned to life as a freak or a cripple.

A team led by Jerry Yang at the University of Connecticut found that cloned cows had flaws in nine out of 10 genes studied on their X-chromosome -- one of the two sex chromosomes that determine a mammal's gender.

Females have two X chromosomes, whereas males have an X and a Y chromosome. Among females, one of the X chromosomes is "silent": it does not activate genes.

Among the cloned cows, though, the flaws meant the copy of the X chromosome was incompletely switched off.

Rather like a computer which receives spluttering, conflicting instructions from two sets of the same software programme, the cow's protein-making machinery went haywire, with catastrophic results for the animal's survival.

Yang team member Cindy Tian said the findings were important because the secret labs trying to replicate a human being basically use the same cloning method.

"It's a very similar procedure," she told AFP by phone. "It's very dangerous to use this current cloning technique for humans. What we have found is really a warning against it."

She predicted that "99 percent (of cloned human embryoes) will fail to come to term, and of the one percent that might live, a high percentage will die shortly after birth because of gene expression problems."

Cloning provides a genetic duplicate of another creature.

The predominant method around the world entails removing the nucleus, or core, from an egg and replacing it with DNA from a donor. This DNA "reprograms" the egg, transferring into it the entire genetic code of the donor.

The big problem, however, is to ensure that all the genes in this transferred code work properly, performing the dazzlingly complex business which is the making of tissue and the repairing of it.

Wide-ranging tests in lab animals, and the experience of cloned farm animals including Dolly the Sheep, have found that -- even though all the genes are there -- many of them do not appear to switch on and off as they should.

Malfunctioning genes can cause an embryo to become malformed, prompting the body to expel it in a miscarriage.

Or they can stealthily pass on tiny flaws that later show up in crippling handicaps or chronic ill-health.

Among cloned animals, only one in six of the embryos survive to birth and many die within a few weeks because of malformation.

Many biotechnologists are repelled by the ethical dilemma posed by human cloning as well as the risk to the first cloned babies, and many governments have raced to pass laws that ban reproductive cloning.

Yet this has not prevented a race among scientific mavericks to become the first to clone a human.

One of them, Italian gynaecologist Severino Antinori, told the French daily Le Monde in an interview published on Saturday that three women were currently pregnant with clones.

All were derived from the nuclear transfer method, he said.

"Two of them are in Russia and the third is in another country," Antinori said. "The births should take place in December 2002 or January 2003."

There are five groups of scientists racing to produce the first cloned human baby, US specialist Panos Zavos said in testimony to the US Congress on May 15. Zavos said he expected the world's first clone to be born some time in 2003.

One of those teams is headed by French chemist Brigitte Boisselier, who works for the Raelian religious sect, which believes that mankind was created by extra-terrestrials.

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TERRADAILY

Three Women Due To Give Birth To Cloned Humans: Doctor

Rome (AFP) Apr 24, 2002
The controversial Italian gynecologist Severino Antinori said in a television interview that he knew of three women who were currently bearing cloned human embryos, although he denied that he had anything to do with the cases.

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