A Korean biomedical company RNL Bio has received an order to clone a pet dog, the first commercial dog cloning in the world. The company, said earlier this week that it is cloning a pit bull-terrier for a Bernann McKinney, a woman living in California, using tissue from her dead pet named Booger for $150,000. It is planning to deliver the clone in February next year. Bernann McKinney had preserved the ear tissue for more than a year at minus 200 degrees in a U.S. laboratory, while seeking firms that could clone the dog. To clone Booger, the researchers have used cells taken from its ear tissue and inserted them into ova which were then implanted into eight female dogs, Ra said. The surrogate mothers were not the same breed as this was unnecessary, Ra said. The dog cloning was verified through independent testing.
The cloning will be conducted by a research team from Seoul National University, while RNL Bio is in charge of business operations. The firm’s CEO expects as many as 500 orders within a few years from rich pet owners in the United States, Japan and Europe. The Seoul National University team produced the world’s first cloned dog, Snuffy, in 2005. But it was also disciplined by the University for fabricating and using incorrect data in research papers regarding human embryo and wolf cloning.
