Here's a sheep!
20 years ago, as a result of cloning, Dolly the sheep was born
Daria Saprykina
On July 5, 1996, 20 years ago, a cloned sheep named Dolly was born. How the history of cloning developed, how society reacted to the birth of Dolly and whether there are exact copies of a person, I found out department of Science "Newspapers.Ru».
Through the thorns to the sheep
In Scotland, the birth of a lamb is not an out-of-the-ordinary event. Nevertheless, two decades later, a group of scientists led by Jan Wilmut and Keith Campbell from the Roslin Institute, located near Edinburgh, can recall the events of July 5, 1996 to the smallest detail. Perhaps because that day was one of the happiest in their lives: the beginning of a new era in the history of science, a reward for loyalty to beliefs, recognition of the power of thought. Dolly's appearance was preceded by an almost two-year series of unsuccessful cloning experiments: transplanted embryos died, sheep had miscarriages, newborn lambs were unable to live. In total, several hundred studies were conducted, which gave almost no results. The leadership of the institute gradually ceased to believe in the success of the venture, and at the same time to finance it.
However, to call Dolly the first cloned sheep or, moreover, the first cloned mammal would not be entirely correct. Almost ten years ahead of scientists from Scotland, the Dane Steen Willadsen. In 1984, he cloned a sheep for the first time by transplanting a nucleus from embryonic cells.
The history of cloning begins even earlier. The starting point can be considered the emergence of the cellular theory, which was put forward by Theodor Schwann back in 1839. Its essence is expressed in just a few words: every cell comes from a cell. At the end of the XIX century, in 1892, Hans Dreisch was able to grow individual sea urchin individuals from separated embryonic cells. On the eve of the First World War, Hans Spemann transplanted a nucleus from one cell to another. In 1962, the future Nobel laureate in medicine John Gurdon cloned a frog, and the name of identical individuals – "clones" – was proposed by John Haldane only a year later. Our compatriot Georgy Lopashov can rightfully join the ranks of scientists who have conducted successful experiments on cell nucleus transplantation. In the 1940s, he was actively involved in cloning frogs and in 1948 wrote an article that summarized the results of his work. However, by an unfortunate coincidence, in August of the same year, a meeting of the All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences named after V.I. Lenin (VASHNIL) was held, which approved the "Lysenkoism", or a ban on genetic research in the USSR, after which Lopashov, like many of his colleagues, had to suspend work.
If Wilmut and Campbell were not pioneers in cell nucleus transplantation, and Dolly was the first cloned creature, why did they get worldwide fame? Because the science fanatics, together with their team, really managed the almost impossible: if earlier researchers tried to grow individuals with identical genetic material from embryonic cells, then Wilmut and Campbell were able to do the same with adult cells. Dolly the sheep is also unique in that she has three "moms" and no "dads" at once. An unfertilized egg was obtained from one female, from which the nucleus, where the genetic information is located, was subsequently removed. Another took a breast cell (which is somatic, not sexual) and also extracted the nucleus. By connecting it with an egg, the embryologists planted the resulting cell of the surrogate mother.
The "father" for Dolly was still found, but later, as a joke, they began to call Jan Wilmut. He was knighted in 2007. Campbell, by the way, put up with the supporting role with great difficulty. In 1999, Campbell broke with the Wilmut group and went on a solo voyage to the University of Nottingham, where he successfully cloned pigs the following year. In 2012, on the threshold of his 60th birthday, Campbell committed suicide.
A star named Dolly
Being eight months old, Dolly experienced another birth – she was introduced to the public. First, on the tip of a pen, in an article published on February 27, 1997 in the journal Nature. As Robin McKie, a journalist of the British edition of The Observer, recalled, one of the first to tell the mass reader about cloning, he immediately felt the future sensation. However, McKie admitted, he was afraid that he had misunderstood the scientific article and in fact everything might not be so grandiose. The alarms were false, the news was immediately picked up by colleagues.
All the next day, articles were published with the headlines: "Hello, Dolly!", "Is it a miracle or a monster?", "Sex is outdated?", "Oh brave new world" (with a hint of the plot of the eponymous dystopian novel by Aldous Huxley, according to which people are not born, but appear from a test tube), "Will we learn how to clone a human?".
Journalists from different countries came to visit the sheep in a modest pen. Scientists from the Roslin Institute say with a smile that Dolly was quite photogenic, felt her popularity and posed with undisguised pleasure on a curly muzzle. No wonder she was named after the popular American singer Dolly Parton with a very impressive bust. The replicated pictures of the cloned sheep in newspapers and reports with her participation were a symbol of the fact that the new century and the new millennium came much earlier than the due date.
Pro et contra
The publication of the Scottish embryologists in the journal Nature coincided with the news of the successful cloning of rhesus monkeys at the Oregon Primate Research Center. There was a growing opinion in society that scientists in their experiments to create identical creatures were getting closer to man. The discussions went far beyond the laboratories. Opinions were sharply divided into pros and cons. Apologists tried to prove that many childless couples around the world will be able to have offspring; a person, prolonging himself in copies, will gain immortality; if you clone Einstein or Picasso, geniuses will return in our time (forgetting that intelligence and creativity come not only from a set of genes). Opponents of the appearance of human clones rested on the norms of morality and ethical principles. "Who will be responsible for the damaged bodies and mutilated destinies of people as a result of unsuccessful experiments?" they asked. "The reproduction of mammals in an asexual way goes against all the principles of nature!", "Our strength lies in diversity, not identity!", "God creates everyone unique!" – indignant exclamations were heard.
Realizing that cloning is not far behind genome editing, the public reminded scientists of eugenics and the idea of creating an ideal nation for the Third Reich. The then 42nd President of the United States, Bill Clinton, after a meeting of the bioethics Commission, imposed a moratorium on human cloning and banned state funding of any organizations engaged in conducting such experiments. Later, bans on human cloning at the legislative level appeared in Australia, Austria, Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Canada, Finland, France, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, Sweden, Japan. In 2010, the corresponding moratorium was extended in the Russian Federation.
The timid voices of scientists are drowned in arguments. Researchers admit that cloning technologies are still imperfect even for animals, and even more so, few people will take up copying a person. And yet there were similar precedents. In 2002, the president of Clonaid, Brigitte Boiselier, told the media about the birth of the first cloned girl, named Eva in honor of her foremother. The court decided to present evidence and hand over the child to the authorities.
However, the company's employees, most of whom considered themselves the ancestors of alien beings, refused to present anything.
Animal rights activists are also trying to fight the cloning of living beings. Of the 277 embryos planted in February 1996, only Dolly developed and survived, most of the surrogate mothers died with the fetus. To date, animal cloning experiments are not prohibited, and over the past 20 years scientists from different countries have managed to create exact genetic copies of mice, cats, deer, horses, bulls, dogs, camels.
Goodbye, Dolly!
The lamb lived only seven incomplete years – almost half the allotted time. On February 14, 2003, it was decided to euthanize Dolly, who was suffering from lung disease. During its short life, the cloned lamb brought six lambs conceived naturally from David's lamb. Studies of Dolly's body continued after her death. Scientists have stated initially short telomeres of sheep, which could cause premature death.
Today, Dolly's effigy is on display at the Royal Museum of Scotland, where everyone, as in 1997, can see this miracle.
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05.07.2016