Science Bulletins: Cloning and Conservation

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Genetics and Society: A Course for Educators

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American Museum of Natural History

Genetics and Society: A Course for Educators

72 ratings

How have advances in genetics affected society? What do we need to know to make ethical decisions about genetic technologies? This course includes the study of cloning, genetic enhancement, and ownership of genetic information. Course participants will acquire the tools to explore the ethics of modern genetics and learn how to integrate these issues into their classrooms.

From the lesson

DNA Fingerprinting, Cloning, and the Future

You will explore systems biology, stem cells, and cloning and the applications of these technologies. You will also learn about the ethics of cloning, which will be the basis for your written assignment, which opens this week.

Recent Developments in Cloning8:44

Science Bulletins: Cloning and Conservation9:30

Meet the Instructors

Rob DeSalle, Ph.D.
Curator
Division of Invertebrate Zoology
David Randle, Ph.D.
Senior Manager of Professional Development
Education Department

[MUSIC].

[NOISE].

We planned the day that we would want this very special calf to be born.

All our plans were aimed at getting the fetus

mature enough to live when it came out into

the air, and yet not so mature that it

would Come out by itself and we would miss it.

>> It's been a long ten months. I know, lost a lot of

sleep thinking, what happens if this animal doesn't make it?

This could be a severe blow to

the potential use of cloning technology and conservation.

It felt like the whole world was kind of watching

what we were doing, and so I was pretty nervous.

I'm not getting

it out this way.

[INAUDIBLE]

When I first heard about this plan to clone a gower, I

was very intrigued, a gaur is an ox-like animal that lives in

Asia and it's actually threatened in the world, there's very few individuals

left, somewhere between 13 and 30 thousand are left in the wild.

I think the fact that this species is a threatened

species added a different element to the whole question of cloning.

It's very different if you're using it for

conservation than if you're using it for domestic species.

>> going to be a tough one to roll over, José.

>> Jeez. >>

[SOUND]

>> When we had Noah's genetic material through a third party called Rescue.

His cell line originated from the San Diego Zoo.

The gaur died in captivity I believe in 1992.

so the tissue sample was cryopreserved, or frozen, for about eight years.

What we wanted to do at the laboratory in Wooster was to apply a

principle of somatic cell cloning, but to kind of put a slight twist on

it by doing a procedure what we

call cross-species nuclear transfer or cross-species cloning.

And what that involves is taking genetic material from one

species and fusing it to the egg of another species.

[MUSIC]

We had a whole group of mature cow eggs that actually have cow DNA inside them.

For us to be able to utilize those eggs we have to remove the cow DNA.

>>

[MUSIC]

>> We then picked up an individual gaur

cell that contained a nucleus that had

gower DNA present. Placed that cell into the egg.

[MUSIC]

Applied an electrical pulse that allows the two components to fuse together.

We then apply some chemical that induce what we

call fertilization inference and that embryo then starts to divide.

We keep those embryos in culture for seven days.

[MUSIC]

We then ship the embryos back to Iowa at Transover Genetics.

Which they then transfer these to gower embryos into a domestic cow.

>> Got it.

>> So the whole project was done without ever

having to come in contact with a living gaur.

[NOISE]

And, actually, that's important when you're looking

at this in the field of conservation.

There are so few of these animals left, many

zoos don't want us doing research on their gaur population.

So, we were able to actually reproduce a

gaur without ever having to touch a living gaur.

[NOISE]

[CROSSTALK]

[CROSSTALK]

>> I have the cord?

[INAUDIBLE]

>> The delivery itself is nerve racking for two reasons.

Firstly it's always a little bit tense because you don't

know what is going to come out of the recipient animal.

How healthy it will be and how much work yuo have to put in to resucitating it.

So it's always.

A tense time when you get a neonatal, a newborn

animal, and you have to see whether it's going to breathe.

But it was even more special in this case because it was such a unique

animal and it's the only one that we had to work with.

If this one didn't live, there was no second chance.

It would take another year or so to get more pregnancies on the way.

[SOUND]

>> I think this type of procedure can be of some use in conservation biology.

As a scientist, I'm aware that habitat preservation is extremely

important, and biodiversity is important for survival of the species.

What we were trying to show with this

technology was that potentially this could salvage genetics.

That would have been lost in a population so in Noah's case,

he was actually derived from a gaur that had not reproduced

or allowed his genetics to go on to the next generation.

We're now able to technically salvage that genetics

that would have been lost from that male gaur.

>> want to see if he'll stand or no? >>

[INAUDIBLE]

>> Cloning has the possibility

to bolster, diminishing populations of animals

>> The question is: should it be used.

My worry is that the public and politicians

may think of this as an easy fix.

Why conserve animals in the wild if we can go

ahead and clone them in the future and replace them?

The problem is, that's absolutely not true.

Biodiversity is

so complex, and the interactions between species and, their environment and within

species are things we can't replicate, as smart as we are and as much as we try.

And I think the safest and best thing

to do is to let biodiversity alone and continue

as much possible rather than thinking that if we

put our energy and effort into something like cloning

we can somehow replace what we've lost. >> Bessy doesn't have a

calf to look after but she won't be missing that too much.

She's not bellowing.

She's recovered from the surgery. Recovered from the c-section very well.

And Noah is looking great. because he can stand up.

He's very alert and active.

He's not as advanced as a normal calf would be

at 12 hours, but we think he's doing just fine.

>> I'm

kind of tired.

It's been a long couple of days, every couple of hours

coming back, checking on the cow and then checking on the calf.

And I think, I'm still slightly in shock.

Every time I go and check on Noah I look at it,

and my first impressions are, oh it's another cloned calf, and then.

I stop to think I'm like well wait, no this

is actually a wild animal that's sitting out here and

then I think about it I'm like it's the first cloned.

Endangered species, and, and it feels pretty good.

[BLANK_AUDIO].

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