Chinese Scientists Cloned Two Monkeys After Inspired Of Dolly the Sheep

Their existence proves that animals as complex as monkeys can be cloned, too. “It’s the first time that primates have been born using the technique of somatic cell nuclear transfer, which is the technique that was used to produce Dolly the sheep, gosh, nearly 22 years ago now”, he said. Trounson notes that monkeys are costly, researchers hesitate to use monkeys if alternatives are available, and drug regulatory agencies “don’t demand monkey studies anymore”. A second monkey, identical to the first, was born 10 days later. These monkeys are alive and well as of press time for this article.

Experts disagree on whether, as the Chinese scientists argue, monkey clones would accelerate biomedical progress. But until now, they have been unable to make babies this way in primates, the category that includes monkeys, apes and people.

However, Muming Poo, a neuroscientist and member of the cloning team, said: “Monkeys are nonhuman primates that are evolutionarily close to humans”.

The news may be alarming to many, and the reason for the research and cloning of primates is likely to renew debate about scientific testing and animal rights.

“We’re excited, extremely excited”, said Mu-ming Poo of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (lead author on this research) per NPR. “I don’t think it would be advisable to anyone to even think about it”, he said.

China has listed the brain science program as a key project for the 13th Five-Year Plan period (2016-2020) and is working to become a world leader in primate research.

It was the first time scientists had been able to clone a mammal from an adult cell. Courtesy of E. Sasaki et al., 2009. Females’ eggs are harvested in surgical procedures, and they’re then implanted with cloned embryos.

Cloning specialist Shoukhrat Mitalipov of the Oregon Health and Science University in Portland believes the study deserves appreciation.

The team tweaked the SCNT procedure using new technology that helped with the nucleus transfer and the fusion of cells. You can see a photo gallery of the monkeys here.

With this type of cloning technique, Keefer noted that researchers can give all the clones a specific type or variant of a gene, perhaps one that causes an incurable disease like cystic fibrosis.

Dr Katy Taylor, from the anti-vivisection group Cruelty Free International, said: “The scientists themselves admit that their work has involved the abnormal development and death of many monkeys before and after birth”.

The world was forever changed in 1996 when a sheep named Dolly was born.

What is more interesting to note is that the technique will allow researchers to create whole labs full of genetically identical monkeys. This paper can be found in Trends in Pharmacological Sciences with code DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0165-6147 (00) 01707-7 as of May of 2001.

The team went through more than 400 egg cells in all, and transferred 260 embryos into monkey surrogates. “It will give us an worldwide edge in the research of primate brains”, Poo added. Tetra, a rhesus monkey, was born in 1999 through a simpler method called embryo splitting – which is like how twins form in the womb. His approach could be further applied in autism or immunodeficiency research. Humans are in the primate family. But he emphasizes his group is following global guidelines for the treatment and care of their monkeys. We’re always on the lookout for more copy-paste monkey babies to write about!