Clone Gallery

"Meet Snuppy, the first cloned puppy, a scientific tour de force and a hint of stranger things to come"

• The quest to clone a dog has been a great objective in the tricky field of mammalian cloning.
• Since Dolly, the sheep was cloned in 1996, scientists have followed with pigs, cattle, mice, rabbits, horses, and cats.

Finally, a dog was cloned in 2005

• Despite many efforts, no one has ever created a genetic double of "man's best friend" until 2005.
• No one was able to clone a dog until South Korean researcher Woo Suk Hwang and his team at Seoul National University brought "Snuppy the puppy" into the world.
• The name comes from "Seoul National University puppy"; resulting in SNUppy.
• Snuppy's entire genome came from a single cell from the ear of a three-year-old Afghan hound.
• Some dog owners are asking: "When can I clone my dog?" The answer: "Not soon."
• Another question people are asking: "What will they clone next?" The DNA of several rare or endangered animals has been stored in cryogenic freezers, including two types of antelope. The next "logical step" would be to clone a primate
• Human cloning may still be anathema (reviled, loathed), but the world seems to be inching ever closer; especially, by scientists in Asia.
• The Korean success has proven that cloning a dog is possible, but it's not easy.
• In fact, billionaire John Sperling, who cofounded Genetic Savings & Clone (GS&C), located in Sausalito, California, has already spent seven years and more than nineteen million dollars in vain attempts to clone a dog.

Cloning Snuppy took nearly three years and cost millions of dollars to accomplish

• Hwang's ultimate motive, he says, is to create a research model for making stem cells that could cure disease in people.
• "Compared with rodents," he said, dog cells "are more similar to human stem cells."
• Despite the problems, Genetic Savins & Clone still wants to capture the "Fido-cloning market" and company scientists are striving to reduce the inefficiencies involved with the special canine problems.
• When and/or if they manage to clone a dog, it won't be cheap.
• GS&C is now charging $32,000 for a cat and it will be much more for a dog.

Clone Gallery

One species after another is yielding to a technique that was once pure science fiction:

1. 1996, Dolly, a sheep, was history's first cloned mammal which was achieved in Scotland.
2. 2001, CC (carbon copy) was the first cloned house pet which was achieved at Texa A&M at College Station, Texas.
3. 2003, Idaho Gem, a mule even though mules are almost always sterile, so the first equine clone is doubly rare.
4. 2005, Snuppy, the dog, cloned in Seoul, South Korea.
5. Next? Who? What? When? Where?

Couple will pay $2.3 million to have the family pet cloned

A couple who are convinced they have the perfect dog with the perfect bark and the perfect howl are giving $2.3 million to Texas A&M University to clone their beloved animal, Missy.

Besides making a litter of Missy pups, the Texas A&M scientists hope to learn more about canine reproduction and improve contraception and sterilization methods. The project could also lead to the replication of exceptional animals; such as, guide dogs or rescue dogs.

A copy-service store once had a sign that read, "Clone your own." So where did the word "clone" come from? It’s etymological source is Greek, and means "twig, slip, sprout", or "shoot" and apparently refers to the reproduction of the plant from which the twig comes.