Bacteria have undergone “cloning” for three billion years, long before cells ever combined and formed the first animals, although the appropriate word is binary fission. Binary fission is a fairly common process in which inside a bacteria’s nucleus polymerase works to replicate DNA and it ultimately ends in there being two cells or bacteria, both having complete sets of DNA. Cell division is the process for cells and is very much the same. Another type of cloning is used by scientists in research labs in which they take segments of DNA and replicate them using specialized technology so that there is ample material for further examination. The type of cloning that receives much controversy and pops into people’s heads when mentioned is “reproductive cloning” in which genetically identical organisms are produced such as the famous Dolly (Wexler). However, it was a long progression for science to grow where it is today. In fact the first experiment was rudimentary at best; the scientist behind it was simply required to shake a few …show more content…
Somatic cell nuclear transfer is taking the nucleus from the cell of a mature animal and inserting it into an embryo, very different from and much more difficult than regular nucleus transfer. The struggle with this type of transfer is that adult genes have already differentiated and “shut down” unlike embryonic cells and in order to complete the transfer scientists must reset these cells to their embryonic state. A considerable amount of times this process is incomplete, causing the embryo to be unable to mature properly. Three sheep went into the creation of Dolly. An egg was extracted from a Scottish Blackface, udder cells were removed from a ewe and the new embryo was placed into the “mother” sheep. Dolly was the only embryo out of 277 to develop and survive all the way to birth (“The History of Cloning”). The significance of Dolly, although a influential scientific procedure, was how it opened the doors to real life human cloning as before it had only been science fiction.
By harnessing human cloning and having the ability to harvest stem cells without having to harvest them from embryos would allow it to be easier to treat those with neurodegenerative