Future Prospects for Animal Cloning
Peter Zeblisky
ENC 1101
Causal essay
1523 words
The advancements in the technologies and efficiencies of animal cloning have grown exponentially in the last decade. Since the birth of Dolly in 1997 we have cloned nineteen other animals successfully. With the continuation of advancements in animal cloning, it is feasible for this process to become an accepted reality into many sectors of our lives. Many issues such as food shortages, the endangerment of certain species, infertility, and a lack of transplant organs all have potential for cloning to be utilized as a solution. As animal cloning continues to be researched in these sectors it will soon be applied to the fields of live stock agriculture, animal preservation, human medicine, and human reproduction.
Before going into the applications of animal cloning we must first analyze what will allow it to become an efficient enough process to be applied in the real world. Today, technology is more advanced than it ever has been before. The same goes for the technology utilized in animal cloning. For example, Peter Gwynne, a writer and editor for Science Magazine noted that the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) which was once a complex idea discovered by scientist Kary Mullis, is now able to be produced and transported around the globe. Currently, PCR is a tool used my most scientists and is being made even more user friendly as we digress (Gwynne). The polymerase chain reaction is a technology in molecular biology used to amplify a copy of DNA generating millions of copies. Now, a piece of technology that is keystone to cloning can be easily operated by scientists all across the globe as opposed to the select few who possessed it. This...
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...e applications are morally permissible they certainly are future prospects as animal cloning continues.
Works Cited
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Understanding the facts as well as procedures between the many different types of cloning is very crucial. When everything boils down there are three types of cloning known as DNA cloning, therapeutic cloning and reproductive cloning. DNA cloning is the copying of a gene in order to transfer it into another organism which is usually used by farmers in most of their crops. Therapeutic cloning is the use of stem cells used to help take the place of whatever cell is missing which is potentially used to help the ill. Stem cells contain the potential to grow and help replace the genes that are missing in order to fix whatever is genetically wrong with your body or any genes that you may be missing. Reproductive cloning actually produces a living animal from only one parent. The endless possibilities and perhaps hidden motives of using genetic engineering are what divide as well as destroy the scientific community’s hope for passing laws that are towards pro cloning. Many people within soci...
Another perk to cloning is that we could possibly alter animals to give more effective products, or more desirable products. For example a herd of sheep in Montreal have a gene in their DNA that lets them produce spider silk through their milk. It is said that bulletproof vests can be made from this silk. Just imagine the possibilities if we were able to create such animals. By using the cloning process, they can make many products that can be helpful to the environment and the people.
The goals and purposes for cloning range from making copies of those who have died, to better the engineering of offspring in humans and animals (Hawley, 1998). Cloning could also directly offer a means of curing diseases or could offer a technique that could extend means to acquiring new data for the sciences of embryology and how. organisms develop as a whole over time. Currently, the agricultural industry demands nuclear transfer to produce better. livestock, and cloning could massively improve the agricultural industry as the technique.
...lter the animals’ new traits so that they could resist diseases. Cloning could be performed on animals of all forms (i.e. fishes, poultry), to downsize the chance of spreading food diseases to the human race.
In recent decades, questions about genetic engineering, genetic modification, and cloning of animals and humans are on the minds of many. On February 27, 1997 when Dr. Ian Wilmut and his team sent chills down our spine with the announcement of the first successfully cloned sheep Dolly. At this time the reality of animal cloning stared us in the face while the human cloning was just around the corner.
It's been three years since the birth of Dolly, the world's first successfully cloned animal. The announcement of her birth brought about much ado and sparked many debates concerning the morality of cloning. In the three years since Dolly was created, the debate over cloning has swelled and receded, but has never been put to rest. A compelling issue that has come into focus in the past several years is the idea of human cloning. Many scientists believe that it is inevitable because the technology is there, and anything that can be done eventually will be done. They preach the value of human clones, dropping phrases like 'cure for disease' and 'prolonged life' to entice the public into supporting their cause. Though these concepts seem beguiling, the notion of human cloning, when looked at as a whole, has serious repercussions and should not be entertained lightly.
Imagine having to explain to your child why they don’t look like you because of you’re selfishness. Imagine thinking your going to design your baby and turns out it has severe leukemia because scientists didn’t put together your baby right. Where Genetic Engineering and Cloning is headed this is possible. Not only is this effecting your child its affecting the whole world as well. Many people think they only do this in humans it happens in plants and animals too. Genetic Engineering and Cloning changes the natural possess in humans, plants, and animals.
Since 1885, there have been a number of researchers, scientists, geneticists, reproductive technologists and embryologists, such as August Weismann, Hans Spemann, Walter Sutton, Paul Berg, Steen Willadsen, et al., who have contributed much to the research and development of our current concepts of cloning. Particularly two of the more recent renowned contributors to cloning research and experimentation are Ian Wilmut, a Ph. D. in animal genetic engineering, and Richard Seed, who founded Fertility and Genetics in the 1980s.
Even though cloning methods have been in use for an extended period of time, the idea of a clone was never thought to be realistic until recently. For thousands of years, humans have been cloning plants through asexual propagation. This is simply the process of stem cutting or grafting a mammal was performed in Switzerland nearly 20 years after the carrot plant where mice cells were cloned. Later, in 1997, Dolly the sheep’s mammary cells were cloned (Lee). This was a major success for science because it was the first time an adult cell was used in which results in a clone of the previous generation of the plant and is still a method used today. It wasn’t until 1958 when modern cloning began with a carrot and in 1964 when scientist John Gurdon started the beginning of animal cell cloning of toad tadpoles. The first successful clone of embryonic cell. After scientists gained a greater knowledge of the process of cloning, they realized that it could possibly be used to benefit the world. In 2001, the first endangered species, the bull gaur, was cloned, and in...
In the essay, Cloning Reality: Brave New World by Wesley J. Smith, a skewed view of the effects of cloning is presented. Wesley feels that cloning will end the perception of human life as sacred and ruin the great diversity that exists today. He feels that cloning may in fact, end human society as we know it, and create a horrible place where humans are simply a resource. I disagree with Wesley because I think that the positive effects of controlled human cloning can greatly improve the quality of life for humans today, and that these benefits far outweigh the potential drawbacks that could occur if cloning was misused.
Cloning has become a major issue in our modern world, from moral, ethical, and religious concerns, to the problem of financial and government support. Human cloning is one of the most controversial topics, and because of this, many of the new important discoveries and beneficial technologies have been overlooked and ignored. Reproductive cloning technology may offer many new possibilities, including hope for endangered species, resources for human organ transplants, and answers to questions concerning cancer, inherited diseases, and aging. The research that led up to the ability to clone mammals started more than a century ago. From frogs to mice to sheep to humans, reproductive cloning promises many possibilities.
In recent years our world has undergone many changes and advancements, cloning is a primary example of this new modernism. On July 5th, 1995, Dolly, the first cloned animal, was created. She was cloned from a six-year-old sheep, making her cells genetically six years old at her creation. However, scientists were amazed to see Dolly live for another six years, until she died early 2005 from a common lung disease found in sheep. This discovery sparked a curiosity for cloning all over the world, however, mankind must answer a question, should cloning be allowed? To answer this question some issues need to be explored. Is cloning morally correct, is it a reliable way to produce life, and should human experimentation be allowed?
Cloning Cloning is a process that creates exact genetic copies of an existing cell. Cloning is a more general term that describes a number of different processes that can be used to produce genetically identical copies. The process of cloning can happen either naturally, for instance, when identical twins develop, or it can be induced through synthetic conditions in a laboratory. There are three different types of artificial cloning: gene cloning, reproductive cloning, and therapeutic cloning.
1) Robertson, John A. “Human Cloning and the Challenge of Regulation,” The New England Journal of Medicine, vol. 339, no. 2 (July 9, 1998), pp. 119-122.
The process of cloning scientifically means to genetically copy an organism and create a 'replica' that has the same DNA, whose cells time have been turned back, yet the two are not exactly the same; not a 'xerox' (Virginia, Sirs). The process of cloning was first tried in 1938 by a German embryologist, Han Spemann, yet it failed. It was not until 1970 when cloning became possible. The first animals to be cloned were frogs. Over the few decades, cows, pigs, a sheep (only Dolly), and monkeys have successfully been cloned. The major reason why humans and other animals have not been cloned yet, aside from the acceptance of society, is because every organism's egg is different: its size, shape, and the stages of its 'life'. This has been proved over and over and therefore, there is no certain procedure or 'ingredients' for a clone (Virginia, Sirs).