On January 24th 2018, scientists at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shanghai, China, announced in the journal, Cell, that they have successfully cloned two Macaque monkeys. The monkeys represent the first time that a primate has been successfully cloned. They were born eight weeks and six weeks ago through the use of the same process that was used to clone Dolly the sheep in 1996. The monkeys names are Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua.
The scientists involved in the cloning used the DNA from a single fetal tissue cell which was then inserted into an egg that had its DNA removed. The DNA and Egg were then fused together using chemicals. Then, a small amount of electricity was used to get the dividing process to begin, which was continued until an embryo was formed. A surrogate mother of the same species was then chosen to carry the embryo to term.
A total of 181 embryos were created, with 79 of the embryos yielding pregnancies. Only Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua were born. The researchers are aware of the concerns over the application being used for human cloning, and say that they only intent to clone monkeys to use in biomedical research.
No comments:
Post a Comment