clonedcat

Pet cloners get success with copy-kitty

Texan scientists have cloned a domestic cat.

The Humane Society is not happy.

Maggie Fox

Reuters

Store your favorite pet's DNA, urges the Internet Web site of Genetic Savings and Clone, the company that helped fund the cloning of the first domestic cat.

While other groups are working to clone sheep and cattle that produce medicine in their milk, Genetic Savings and Clone has a less ambitious but perhaps more heartwarming goal -- helping people breed twins of their beloved pets.

Scientists at Texas A&M University said on Thursday they had used a grant from Genetic Savings and Clone to clone a house cat, and presented the result, a 2-month-old kitten they called cc:, short for carbon copy.

The Humane Society of the United States objected instantly, saying there are already too many unwanted cats and dogs in the United States.

``What is the compelling social purpose behind this experimental practice?'' asked Wayne Pacelle, senior vice president of the group.

Lou Hawthorne, chief executive officer of Genetic Savings and Clone, says it is not too different from championship breeding.

``Cloning is simply the latest form of assisted reproduction, not all that different from artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization -- which were also controversial when first introduced,'' says the company's Web site at http://www.savingsandclone.com.

He said millions of homeless cats and dogs destroyed at shelters each year may eventually benefit from the research.

``It takes eggs to make clones, hundreds if not thousands of eggs. Where do we get those eggs? From spay clinics. What do we give them in exchange for those eggs? We give them money. They will spay hundreds of times more cats with the money we give them than each single clone we make,'' Hawthorne said.

``We are going to make so few of these animals in the foreseeable future,'' he added.

Genetic Savings and Clone, which also promises to clone endangered animals and livestock, was founded by businessman John Sperling, who also founded Apollo Group Inc.

MISSY THE WONDER DOG FIRST PROJECT

The first project was called Missyplicity -- aimed at making a copy of a much-loved longhaired mongrel called Missy. According to her own Web page at http://www.missyplicity.com, Missy is somewhat of a wonder dog, highly deserving of being reproduced in perpetuity.

But it is hard to clone a dog. Duane Kraemer, a cloning expert at Texas A&M, says dog eggs are difficult to get and nurture. ``The dog reproductive cycle is much more complex,'' he added.

Once it became clear they could not immediately clone someone's Fluffy, the company turned to gene banking.

``This was from people who convinced us that an exceptional animal had just died and their genes needed to be preserved, just like art from a burning building,'' Hawthorne said.

Genetic Savings and Clone was born.

``Although we don't have any Missy-clones yet, we believe we're getting very close,'' the company says.

``We've certainly learned a lot, including the best way to store DNA for use in cloning, which is exactly how we'll store your pet's DNA. When cloning becomes feasible and affordable for your pets, their DNA will be safe -- even if they're no longer with you.''

For cat owners, the project is called Copycat.

Missyplicity is funded at $3.7 million and Hawthorne estimated it cost ``hundreds of thousands of dollars'' to produce Copycat and cc:.

While the scientific research is currently being done at A&M, the company is building its own labs nearby in College Station.

``You can't do pet cloning by trial and error,'' Hawthorne said. ``We have our own research team, our own cloning labs, which are every bit as sophisticated as at A&M. We have a 7,000-square-foot lab and a 2,700-acre ranch off-campus.''

The company licenses the right to the nuclear transfer cloning technology from Advanced Cell Technology, the Massachusetts company that has cloned cattle and other animals and that is working to clone human embryos for use in medical research.

Hawthorne said he hopes his company can come up with species-specific cloning technology that it can then license itself.

Russian scientists count dwindling Siberian tigers

Menu	Big cats	Health & Care	Origins	Shorthaired cats
Longhaired cats	Stationeries	My poems	Carnivores	Proverbs
Newsstories	Did you know	Mammals	Dogs	Wolves
Feline poems	Backgrounds	Guestbook	Email	E-cards
Cemetery

To receive our newsletters

Graphics from: