Cloning

WHAT IS CLONING?

1. Who is Dolly?
The first mammal to be cloned from a mature somatic cell,

2. When a zygote divides into to separate cells, it is called:
A fertilized egg.

3. Somatic cells are also called:
Any type of cell in the body, minus the germ cells (sperm and egg).

4. In order to clone a gene, a gene is inserted into a
An egg cell that had its nucleus removed.

5. In order to create an embryo from a somatic cell, the donor egg cell must have its ___________________ removed.
Nucleus.
 

CLICK AND CLONE

6. List all the materials needed to clone a mouse.
a.) The organism you will be cloning
b.) An egg cell donor (it seems to be preferable that it's from the same species)
c.) A surrogate mother
d.) Microscope
e.) Petri dish
f.) Sharp pipette
g.) Blunt pipette
h.) Chemical to stimulate cell division
 
7. Place the following steps in the correct order.

4 Stimulate cell division
6 Deliver baby
2 Remove and discard the nucleus from the egg cell
1 Isolate donor cells from egg donor and germ cell donor
3 Transfer the somatic cell nucleus into the egg cell
5 Implant embryo into a surrogate mother

8. There are two time gaps in the process of cloning. What are they? (ie. what do you have to wait for?)
a.) During the transfer of the somatic nucleus and time is needed so the cell from the donor and the nucleus from the somatic cell can adapt to each other.
b.) After adding the stimulant, the cell must take time to divide a minimal of 16 times and then creating a ball/morula.

9. What color would the cloned mouse be? _____________ What is the name of this mouse? _____________________
a.) Brown.
b.) Mini-Mimi

WHY CLONE?

10. Why is cloning extinct animals problematic?
How are they going to survive? Scientists used to think of cloning a wolly mammoth because they had found the body of one preserved in ice, but how were they going keep it alive? If they were to release into the wild (stupid idea, if they would), how would the mammoth affect the environment, if it could even survive. And if it did and the ecosystem wasn't harmed or upset, what about reproduction? What if there was an error somewhere? Copies of copies, wouldn't the quality eventually deteriorate? Besides, cells already have flaws as it is. Can you imagine how messed up thousands years old cells would be? Just because the body isn't a rotting pile of mean does not mean that the cells are still fit as a fiddle.

11. What are some reasons a person might want to clone a human?
Cloning stem cells so people can be given new cells that have not undergone disease or damage. Also, people who cannot have children who really want them, well, cloning is an option (sure, sure, go ahead and ignore the sad-faced, lonely orphan for your technological child who is an exact replica of you, you dense narcissist. Can't we solve that problem before taking on others?). Quick question, if they can clone humans and clone dead pets, can they do the same for deceased humans? it'd be a little impractical considering they dead person might've been your grandpa and he is now a baby and won't grow up to be the same and will develop his own epigenetic tags that are on or off and inevitably wind up being a different person altogether who just happens to have the same DNA as that guy sitting in his grave over there. Oh, the next option they had listed was to replace a deceased child. Oops. I guess it would make more sense if it was a dead baby or something since epigenetics haven't set in yet. But what if the baby died from some sort of hereditary disease that was recessive and both parents had one copy and hte kid winded up with both. The child would only end up dying again.

THE CLONE ZONE

12. What animal was cloned in 1885?
Sea urchans

13. How did Spemann separate the two cells of the embryo of a salamander in 1902?
He used a noose made of baby hair. I wonder if it was the hair from the clone of the dead baby. . . .

14. The process of removing a nucleus is called
Enucleation

15. In 1952, the nucleus of a ____________ embryo cell was placed into a donor cell. Did it work to clone the animal? ____________
a.) Tadpole.
b.) Not well. The majority died and the few who survived developed abnormally.

16. Can the nucleus of an adult cell be injected into an egg cell and produce a clone?
Yes.

17. Why are mammals hard to clone?
The cells are smaller so it is harder to manipulate them. Funny, 'cause mammals are usually larger than salamanders and frogs. The one they were planning to clone, a rabbit, is larger, certainly. Oh, well. It's not too surprising of a fact.

18. What were the names of the first two cloned cows?
Fusion and Copy. That's scientists for you, always thinking of the most creative names.

19. In what year was the National Bioethics Advisory Council formed?
1995

20. The first mammal clone to be produced from an adult (somatic) cell?
Sheep

21. What do scientists do to adult cells to make them "behave" like embryos?
Electric shocks reset, or rebooted the cells.

22. Transgenic, cloned sheep were used to produce what medical protein?
Producing protein in milk was one way, that way, when the animal was milked, they could simply purify the protein. The protien is used to treat people who suffer from hemophilia.

23. What is a stem cell?
The basic building blocks of life. They are the cells that can divide into multiple cells and can develop into any type of cell (minus nervous cells and cells in your brain).

CLONING MYTHS

24. Briefly describe in your own words, why CC the cat was not identical in color to Rainbow, even though she was a clone.
Calico cats get their multi-colored coats by having genes for certain colors turned on or off on the X chromosome during development. The processes was called X-inactivation that occurs mainly in females. It is an random and erratic process so it's not the same with any two cats. CC's genes had the same X-inactivation which resulted in a lack of orange in her coat.

25. What is "nature vs nurture"?
In the science world, their term of nature vs. nurture is more along the lines of the idea of epigenetics. These scientists' summation of nature vs nurture is that genetics lays down the building blocks then the environment takes those blocks and creates a structure out of them, determining the appearance and personality.

IS IT CLONING OR NOT?

26. For each of the following scenarios, indicate YES (it is cloning) or NO (it is not cloning)

NO Sperm taken from a male goat is combined with a female's egg in a petri dish. The resulting embryo is implanted into the female's uterus to develop
YES (BUT MATURE CELLS ARE PREFRED) A sheep embryo, composed of 16 cells, is removed from the mother's uterus and separated into indivudal cells. Each cell is allowed to multiply, creating 16 separate embryos, which are then implanted in different female sheep to develop to maturity.
NO A cow with many desirable traits is stimulated with hormones to produce a number of egg cells. Each of these eggs is fertilized and implanted into a surrogate mother.
NO In vitro fertilization
YES Cell nuclei from an extinct wolly mammoth are placed into enucleated cow cells.

27. Define or describe each of the following processes (you may need to reset the Cloning or Not Screen)

Invitro fertilization
Eggs are taken from the female's ovaries and placed in a petri dish. Sperm are then released to fertilize the egg which is then placed into the mother's uterus.

Embryo splitting
Embryo splitting can occur naturally with twins or is the method used for cloning. A zyogote (a fertilized egg) divides into two separate cells. With cloning, it's the same processes, only the egg is fertilized in a petri dish and then splits in a petri dish. Both cells must have divided 16 times at least before being placed in the mother.

Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer
An egg cell has its nucleus removed. Then a sommatic cell from the organism you want to clone is taken. The nucleus is removed form the sommatic cell and placed in the egg cell. Some chemicals are added, time passes, the egg is placed in the mother, and later a clone is produced.

Multiple Ovulation Embryo Transfer
A female organism with desired traits has her hormones altered so that she produces more eggs than normal. Sperm from a male organism with desired traits then fertilize the eggs. The eggs are then removed before they attach to the wall of the uterus in the mother.

Artificial Insemination
The process of placing sperm taken from a male and placing it into the female's reproductive track.

WHAT ARE THE RISKS OF CLONING?

28. What is one reason why cloning animals has such a high failure rate?
The success rate is .1-3% because the enucleated egg and the nucleus from the sommatic cell may not be compatible, not to mention the fact that the division may mess up (there are genetic mutations naturally, artificially is so much more messed up). The implanting of the embryo into the surrogate mother may not take hold and if it does, the pregnancy or delivering itself may fall through.

29. What is a telomere and how does it affect cloned animals?
Telomeres are at the end of the chromosomes that get smaller each time the divide, which ages the cell. The more the cell divides, the shorter the telomeres and chromosome. There is no clear effect that this has on cloning. With cattle and mice, the telomeres were longer, increasing the cell lifespan of the animals; with Dolley, the telomeres were shorter and decreasing her cell lifespan.

WHAT ARE SOME ISSUES IN CLONING?

30. Pick one of the questions to ponder and ....ponder it. Write a brief essay on your thoughts and opinions.
I'm gonna play the devil's advocate here and say the main issue is, how can we get the public to agree to human cloning? A big argument is saying that we, as humans, should not impart life. We shouldn't be playing God. But all life is is basically cells working together. "Life" comes as cells turn into a functioning organism and "life goes" when those cells start to malfunction. If you were unable to have kids and that's what you wanted, wouldn't you want to have an option, a possible back-up plan vs. orphans if you really wanted the kid to be "yours" (sure, sure, 'cause there aren't thousands of orphans waiting to be adopted). Or you wanted some part of your child back. Your child who died in a car accident and even though you know the clone won't act the same or really be the same as your child, you can comfort yourself in the knowledge that the clone has your child's genetics in it, and are, in a way, keeping your child alive. Who are you to deny that happiness from other people?

Harvest of Fear

SHOULD WE GROW GM CROPS?
1. What is a GM Crop.
A GM crop is a genetically modified crop.

2. List 2 arguments FOR the growing of GM crops
a.) Stop the need and therefore use of chemicals that act as insect and weed killers.
b.) Genetic engineering is natural because that's all evolution is.

3. List 2 arguments AGAINST the growing of GM crops.
a.) Genetically engineered food is feared to cause allergies and diseases with things like how the food will resist our anti biotics and cause disease-spreading bacteria that are immune to out antibodies (my rebuttal to that, normal food pose the same risks: i.e. peanuts and salmanilla, what if genetic engineering could ERADICATE that threat? Trial and error would have to occur, but at least it offers a possible solution.)
b.) Small farms will go out of business with the wide-spreading, powerful, super-fast growing, market-mad companies taking all the consumers. (I've got no rebuttal for this one.)


ENGINEER A CROP
4. Practice this simulation until you get the largest ears of corn. How many times did it take you?
Three times.


WHAT'S FOR DINNER?
5. List two foods and desribe how they are being modified.
a.)Coffe beans: they are attempting to be genetically modified so that the trees yield decaffinated beans which would then avoid the need to decafinnate the beans later, saving money.
b.) They are attempting to engineer a potato so that it doesn't absorb as much oil when it is fried. Also, on that same note, scientists are trying to create oils that are healthier because they have fewer saturated fats.


VIEW POINTS
Do you think food should be labeled if it has been genetically modified? Why or Why not?
I think so. If genetic engineering provides a huge boost in the economy and gives the companies who manufacture the foods more money, then they should be able bit the bullet and spend the money on labeling the food as genetically engineered or not. Some people, despite arguments for genetically modified foods, do not want to ingest GM crops and companies should respect that. ANd why I am saying that genetically engineered farmers should be the ones to put on the sign that says "genetically engineered" instead of others saying "Not genetically engineered" is because everyone says that GM crops will give a huge boost in the economy and will yield a larger sum of money for the companies who produce GM crops. People also say that small farms will be put out of business due to the take-over of genetic engineering and therefore won't have the money to waste on the label.