Meet Snuppy - the world’s first cloned dog

AN AFGHAN hound called Snuppy was named yesterday as the first dog to be cloned by scientists.

The hairy pup has the same floppy ears as his genetic father, which is not surprising, as it was an ear that provided the skin cell from which he was made.

Scientists in South Korea, which leads the world in cloning, took genetic material from the cell and placed it in an empty egg.

The egg was then stimulated to start dividing and developed into an embryo. Once activated, it was transferred to Snuppy’s surrogate mother, a yellow Labrador.

Snuppy was eventually delivered by caesarean section after a full 60 days of pregnancy. His name stands for Seoul National University puppy, after the centre where the cloning was carried out.

Scientists in Texas announced the birth of a cloned cat, CopyCat, or CC, in 2002. A US company is now offering pet owners the opportunity to clone their cats for $50,000 each.

The first made-to-order kitten clone, Little Nicky, was produced for a Texan woman last year.

Cloning dogs is much more difficult, because their eggs are released from the ovary earlier than they are in other mammals.

The South Korean team, led by Professor Woo Suk Hwang, from Seoul University’s College of Veterinary Medicine, obtained just three pregnancies from more than 1,000 embryo transfers into 123 recipients. Of these, one miscarried. Two puppy clones were eventually born, but one died of pneumonia after just 22 days.

Dr Freda Scott-Park, President Elect of the British Veterinary Association, said she was concerned about the research, published yesterday in the journal Nature.

“No one should underestimate the far-reaching consequences of this work,” she said. “Sadly, however, the media interest is likely to attract pet owners keen to recreate their much-loved pets although this demand is unlikely to be met until the efficiency of cloning is raised.”

“Cloning of animals raises many ethical and moral issues that have still to be properly debated within the profession.”

But an American member of the cloning team, Dr Gerald Schatten, said: “We are not in the business of cloning pets. Nuclear transfer is an extraordinary tool for scientific and medical research. It has never been about reproductive medicine or making any members of our family - even our pets.”