Oregon Researchers Clone Monkeys Team Used Embryos, Rather Than Adult Dna; Success Sparks Fears Of Cloning Of Humans

Researchers have produced two monkeys with a procedure similar to that used to clone a sheep in Scotland, a development expected to help research into AIDS, alcoholism, depression and other illnesses.

The cloning of the rhesus monkey is less dramatic than the cloning of the sheep because primitive embryos, rather than adult animals, were duplicated. But it marks the first time it has been used to reproduce animals so closely akin to humans.

“Everyone is really excited about the potential of this and I think it’s going to make for much, much better science, and much better experiments,” said M. Susan Smith, director of the Oregon Regional Primate Research Center, where the research was conducted.

The cloning procedure, known as nuclear transfer, clears the way for producing genetically identical monkeys that will greatly simplify research, Donald Wolf, a senior scientist at the Oregon Regional Primate Research Center, said at a news conference Sunday.

With genetically different animals, there’s always the possibility that results are due to variations among animals rather than to whatever is being tested. Genetically identical monkeys would be a boon to research because scientists could be more confident of their research results.

Scottish researcher Ian Wilmut, who created Dolly the sheep, called the Oregon development “an important step, but the material they used is fundamentally different and easier to work with.”

Scientists created the two monkeys by developing embryos by taking a set of chromosomes from each of the eight cells in a primitive monkey embryo and inserting them into egg cells where the DNA had been removed.

They were then implanted into surrogate mothers through in vitro fertilization.

The two monkeys born in August are indistinguishable from others their age. They are being raised by their surrogate mothers and probably will live out a life of 15 to 20 years, researchers said. Researchers want to see how the animals reproduce.

Wolf, who also is director of the human in vitro fertilization laboratory at Oregon Health Sciences University, said he has already begun the process of producing a set of monkeys that would be identical.

Because monkeys are so closely related to humans, the Oregon research adds fuel to the growing controversy over the recreation of life through science.

“The downside is that this is one step in the direction of suggesting that nuclear transfer can be done in human beings,” Wolf said. “Of course, we have absolutely no interest in even cloning an adult monkey, let alone cloning a human being.”

Wolf and Smith said animal rights activists should like the development because it means far fewer animals will be used in research because of the uniformity of the monkey clones.

“Where you once needed 20 or 30 animals, maybe now you’d need only three or four,” Smith said.

And while the cloning of adult humans is a more distant possibility, the scientists are well aware of the specter they have raised.

“The idea that there is a rich person who is a maverick or an eccentric or worse out on some island is what we call the Jurassic Park syndrome,” said Russ Meintz, director of the Center for Gene Research and Biotechnology at Oregon State University. “It’s more science fiction than reality.”