Scientists in Shanghai announced this week that they conducted the world's first ever successful monkey cloning using non-reproductive cells.
The two cloned female crab-eating macaques, named Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua (after the word “Zhonghua,” meaning "Chinese Nation"), were born at the Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in late December. A third monkey named Meng Meng is also due at the end of this month, while more are due later this year.
Researchers say Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua have been bottle-fed and are growing normally. The primate pair were photographed monkeying around in their chamber earlier this week.
Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua were cloned using somatic cells — the same method that created Dolly the Sheep, the world's first cloned mammal, in Scotland back in 1996. In the 22 years since Dolly's debut, scientists have been able to clone 23 other mammal species, including cattle, cats, deer, dogs, horses, mules, oxen, rabbits and rats.
But cloning primates has proved much more challenging. Until CAS' landmark procedure, no monkeys had ever been successfully cloned using the 'Dolly method.'
"Cloning monkeys using somatic cells has been a world-class challenge because it is a primate that shares its genetic makeup — therefore all of its complexity — with humans," Pu Muming, director of the neuroscience institute said, according to state-run newspaper China Daily. "For drug and other laboratory tests, scientists have to purchase monkeys from all over the world, which is costly, bad for the environment and produces inaccurate results because each monkey might have different genes."
The breakthrough macaques cloning study is intended to help scientists at pharmaceutical research centers study treatments for human brain and neural diseases, such as Alzheimer's, autism, Parkinson's disease and immune system diseases. Monkeys are much better suited for such medical studies than mice, since their genetic makeup is most similar to that of humans.
Despite concerns, however, the research team insists that they have no plans to clone humans following the milestone achievement.
"We have no plan to clone humans, and social ethics would by no means allow that practice," Pu was quoted as saying, according to Xinhua, another state-run media outlet.
The new cloning achievement could also eventually lead to a reduction in the number of monkeys and other animals used in lab testing. But the controversial experiment has also opened up fresh debates on the ethics of animal testing and cloning.
Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua are not the first monkeys to be produced by cloning. In 1999, a rhesus macaque named Tetra was created using the embryo splitting technique.
[Images via China Daily 1/2/3, Business Insider, BBC]
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